


No Time Like The Rest Of My Life

by tookumade



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe, Inarizaki cast, Japanese Mythology & Folklore, M/M, fox spirits
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-29
Updated: 2018-04-29
Packaged: 2019-04-29 18:00:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14478156
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tookumade/pseuds/tookumade
Summary: The boy raises his eyebrows and straightens his back. “So youcansee me! Hmm… most humans can’t, but if you can, then it means your spiritual powers aren’t too shabby…” A grin spreads across his face, all sharp teeth, very muchfox-like. He leans forward, narrows his eyes, and tenses his shoulders, like he’s ready to pounce. “You’d probably make a tasty snack!”Kita hums. “I might,” he says, “but then who’d bring you pudding?”The grin on the boy’s face disappears in an instant, and he blinks down at him.“What,” he says.





	No Time Like The Rest Of My Life

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nautilics](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nautilics/gifts).



>   
> ............ I'm a month and a half late but look, time is fake anyway ok  
>    
> Happy [belated] birthday to dear Mandy, my punner in crime, fellow fox enthusiast, con buddy, and someone I've had the most heartfelt honour of calling a friend. You are honestly just an amazing person. I hope you enjoy this fic. So many liberties were taken aaahhhhh
> 
> (What shall we do today?)

Whenever Kita sweeps the backyard, wipes down the porch with his grandmother, or does any sort of chore outdoors, he can feel someone watching him. But aside from his grandmother, there is no one else in the yard; he is alone.  
  
He is not alone.  
  
“The deities are omnipresent and watching earnestly,” his grandmother would tell him, but Kita feels like that’s not quite it. Whoever—whatever—is watching him is neither malicious nor benign, and is content to stay out of Kita’s way, if he would stay out of their’s.  
  
He’s carried on since he was quite young. His earliest memory of this was when he was around the age of four, sitting outside on the porch on a warm spring day, flipping through a picture book, with his grandmother sitting beside him, clipping the stems off a large bunch of lilies.  
  
He sees something out of the corner of his eye, but looks up to an empty yard. He thinks it might have been an animal’s tail, but when he goes to investigate, there’s nothing there.  
  
“Maybe the deities are playing tricks on you,” his grandmother had said with a smile as she gathered the lilies into her arms.  
  
It continues on every now and then over the next couple of years, until curiosity gets the better of him. One night, fifteen years old, he leaves a small plate with a piece of daifuku out on the porch. When he returns the next morning, the daifuku is gone.  
  
He doesn’t think much of it. Maybe it was just some hungry birds, or another wild animal.  
  
But he tries again and again.  
  
He leaves out a handful of small rice crackers in a bowl, and finds that they, too, are gone by the next morning. The pudding he’d extracted from its cup and left out on a plate had been eaten too, and the plate licked clean. He leaves two inari sushi pieces, a small piece of castella, a handful of strawberries, some cheese-flavoured biscuits, some nuts in a small dish, a mandarin—all gone by the following mornings. Of these, the leaves of the strawberries, and the peel and seeds of the mandarin remained, rather carefully removed for a wild animal.  
  
Experimentally, Kita also leaves out a small bowl filled with beansprouts, but returns to find that not a single sprout has been eaten. The bowl has been pushed a few centimetres from its original position, and has an air of disgust about it.  
  
“Sorry,” he says aloud, facing the yard. He takes the beansprouts back inside. Later, he leaves another pudding out, and the next morning, only the plate remains again. He supposes this means he has been forgiven.  
  
He looks up, and thinks he can see the flick of a fox tail disappearing over the garden’s high wall.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

He doesn’t do it every night, feeling like that’s a little too close to inviting trouble. He spaces it out, limiting the snack-gifting to two or three times a week, lest whoever—whatever—is out there starts expecting too much. Kita is only human; there is only so much he can give, only so much trouble he can invite.  
  
Kita finally sees _him_ at the age of eighteen: a boy who looks Kita’s age, sitting cross-legged on the high ledge of the wall, balancing effortlessly. He is wearing a black hakama with a dark blue kosode and a light-grey haori, and his hair, gold in colour in the afternoon sun, falls into his eyes with the occasional breeze, but he pays it no attention.  
  
He is a beautiful boy, and yet…  
  
“Are you the fox I see around here sometimes?” Kita asks.  
  
The boy raises his eyebrows and straightens his back. “So you _can_ see me! Hmm… most humans can’t, but if you can, then it means your spiritual powers aren’t too shabby…” A grin spreads across his face, all sharp teeth, very much _fox-like_. He leans forward, narrows his eyes, and tenses his shoulders, like he’s ready to pounce. “You’d probably make a tasty snack!”  
  
Kita hums. “I might,” he says, “but then who’d bring you pudding?”  
  
The grin on the boy’s face disappears in an instant, and he blinks down at him.  
  
“ _What_ ,” he says.  
  
“You like the pudding the best, don’t you? You don’t polish off the other snacks nearly as cleanly.” Kita continues his sweeping of the yard. “Well, that’s just a guess. Feel free to help yourself to my leg, if you like.”  
  
The boy doesn’t answer for a while. Kita almost looks up at him again, but fights his curiosity. Then, he hears the boy’s voice speak quietly, a touch hopefully:  
  
“You have more pudding?”  
  
Kita looks up now, the hint of a smile on his face. “Yes.”  
  
“Here? Now?”  
  
“I can leave some pudding out tonight, and I’ll collect the plate in the morning, as usual.” Kita looks around at the yard, neat and tidy. He leans on the broom’s end and peers up at him. “You prefer it out of the cup, right?”  
  
The boy raises his eyebrows eagerly. “I don’t mind, either way. Is that a promise, then, Kita Shinsuke-sama?” When Kita blinks, startled, the boy adds, “Oh, even _you_ get surprised! Of course I know your name; I’ve been here for years and years. _Kita Shinsuke_ , they call you. It’s a very _you_ name.”  
  
“I’m assuming that’s a compliment,” says Kita.  
  
“Well, it’s not an _insult_ ,” says the boy briskly. “So, is that a promise, Kita-sama?”  
  
Now, Kita hesitates. For a spirit to know his name, was a little unnerving. To give one’s name to someone, was to give them power. He could easily give his name to family, friends, and teachers, but to spirits? _Fox spirits_? Who else knew? Kita reassures himself that this fox probably didn’t know for sure how his name is written, which kanji to use, but he wonders how much this would help him, if he were to ever get into trouble with him.  
  
Well. It had been this long, and he’d left Kita alone all this time. So there was that.  
  
This was all right, wasn’t it?  
  
Kita exhales and nods. “I’ll leave a pudding out for you. Would you like a spoon?”  
  
“Yes,” the boy says, and then after a pause, adds, “Please.”  
  
“All right.”  
  
“Well, then.” The boy—the fox—stands up, tall on the wall’s edge, ready to leave. “I’ll be looking forward to it, Kita-sama!”  
  
“Wait,” says Kita, and the boy does, peering down at him curiously. “What can I call you?”  
  
He expects a joke, perhaps suspicion, or even no answer. To give one’s name, was to give the recipient power, after all—were the fox spirits as suspicious of humans, as hesitant as Kita was?  
  
Kita finds himself holding his breath as the boy regards him for a moment longer, until a small smile spreads across his face, startlingly warmer than Kita had been expecting.  
  
“Atsumu,” says the boy. “Call me Atsumu.”  
  
And with that, he turns and jumps down from the wall, over to the outside.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Over the next couple of weeks, the boy, the fox spirit, _Atsumu_ , would watch from his spot on the edge of the wall as Kita did his chores. Kita would offer a snack for later at night, and Atsumu would accept, and then he would leave shortly after. When they exchanged conversation, it was usually small-talk, and brief. Kita sometimes asked about Atsumu’s day, because what _did_ fox spirits do? But Atsumu would just shrug and say something along the lines of, ‘nothing much happened today’. He never asked Kita in return. Eventually, Kita figured out that it wasn’t because Atsumu didn’t care, but perhaps because he already knew.  
  
_(The deities are omnipresent and watching earnestly.)_  
  
It didn’t seem like Atsumu would ever use Kita’s name for anything nefarious, but it rather felt like there was a line between them that Kita was hesitant to cross, and a line that Atsumu didn’t know that he could cross, like they were each careful to keep their distance, with a caution that was more default than anything. As the weeks passed by, Kita grew more and more curious about him, more and more tired of this odd push-and-pull. He wondered if this counted as inviting trouble.  
  
One day, Atsumu is once again perched on the ledge of the wall. Kita, taking a break from university work, is sitting on the porch and clipping the stems of a large number of lilies to decorate around the house.  
  
“Would you like a peach? Or some rice crackers?” Kita calls out, pointing to a small plate with some peach slices and a bowl of rice crackers beside him. He had never offered Atsumu snacks in the daytime like this before. Atsumu regards him for a moment, before hopping down from the wall as easily as walking, and then strolling over to the porch. Though he is clearly trying to maintain an indifference about him, Kita doesn’t miss the eagerness on his face as he eyes the food.  
  
“Squid-flavoured,” Atsumu mutters under his breath when he sits down and samples a rice cracker. He takes another, munching contently.  
  
“Is it always you, eating the snacks?” Kita asks. The line is finally being carefully crossed. “Are you alone?” He’s never asked Atsumu this before. He almost doesn’t expect an answer, but…  
  
“Mm… I’m not,” says Atsumu as he begins nibbling on a slice of peach, humming approvingly at the sweetness. “There are other spirits aside from me, but I’m the only one who comes this way.”  
  
“Why’s that?”  
  
“It’s because you’re unusual, Kita-sama,” Atsumu answers. “You’ve got an exceptionally intimidating air about you. I’ve heard other spirits say they’re too afraid to come by here, in case they meet your eyes. I suppose that’s why you haven’t seen any of us until now.”  
  
Well. Kita’s been told he can be come off as a bit cold sometimes, but to hear that _spirits_ find him scary… it’s not like he understands their nature, but given the myths and legends he’d heard, he wasn’t expecting this.  
  
“You don’t have to be so formal around me,” says Kita slowly. And then: “You don’t find me intimidating, Atsumu?”  
  
“Of course I did!” Atsumu yelps, startling Kita. Atsumu shakes a peach slice at him, now. “Every time you were nearby, I ran away, thinking you might steal my soul! But then you started leaving out all those snacks, and… I mean, when you left those beansprouts, _honestly_ , I thought you were _insulting_ me—”  
  
“I was just curious,” says Kita in a pacifying sort of tone.  
  
“—but then I heard you apologise! And I’ve been watching you do your chores so _patiently_ and _diligently_ , and the way you speak to your granny, _gentle_ , and the way we have spoken since properly meeting for the first time…” Atsumu shakes his head. “You’re _kind_ , Kita Shinsuke-san. Scary, but _kind_.”  
  
Kita has been holding this particular stem of lilies for a while now, surprised into inaction. He blinks, and then clips it with his shears, and asks, “Do you still find me intimidating, then?”  
  
“Just a little,” says Atsumu. “But I think you’re all right.”  
  
A small huff of laughter escapes Kita’s throat, and he is smiling as he clips another lily’s stem. Atsumu looks at him, startled, and then quickly looks away again, intently eating another slice of peach.  
  
“I don’t tell anyone about this place,” he mutters. “I come here because no one else does. My friends think I’m just off exploring. If my brother knew, he would come here to eat everything, but I’m not about to share with him.”  
  
“You have a brother?” Kita asks.  
  
“A twin.” Atsumu nods, picking at some rice crackers. “He’s a pain. I’m the better looking one.”  
  
“You don’t get along with him?”  
  
“It’s hard to say. We fight a lot, but it’s never anything too serious.” Atsumu stares thoughtfully into the distance. “There are other fox spirits, and I get along with them enough. Things are all right in our circle.”  
  
It’s the first time Kita has heard so much about him—the first time Atsumu has offered something so close and intimate. It’s a nice feeling, talking like this and sharing part of an unhurried day together.  
  
“You said you’ve been here a long time,” says Kita slowly.  
  
“Yes. I like my circle—they’re like my family—but sometimes, I like to get away for a bit, too. I come here, because it’s nice and quiet. Not much has changed since your grandfather’s days.”  
  
“You knew my grandpa?” Kita asks.  
  
“I did—he was a quiet, but very caring man. He loved your granny very much. He never knew me, though; he couldn’t see me. You’re the first to be able to since your great-grandfather. Did you know, your granny used to leave snacks out, too?” Atsumu adds wistfully, popping another peach slice into his mouth. Kita looks at him, surprised.  
  
“Did she? She never said.”  
  
“Mm. When she first married your grandfather and lived here, she would leave food. She hasn’t done that for while, though. I think she stopped after you were born.”  
  
“What snacks did she leave you?”  
  
“The same as you—fruit, biscuits, little cakes… rice, sometimes. The dorayaki she used to make has always been the best, though.” Atsumu pokes his chin thoughtfully. “It’s been a while since I’ve had it. I miss it.”  
  
“I wonder if she’d believe me, if I told her about you,” Kita muses.  
  
“Hm!” Atsumu shakes his head, helps himself to another rice cracker. “Your granny believes in the deities and spirits and all things outside of the mundane world. I’d say she believes in us more than you do, and yet, she can’t see us. She has never been able to.”  
  
“I think,” says Kita quietly, “she doesn’t need to see you, in order to believe in you.”  
  
Caught off-guard, Atsumu stares at him, the silence between them punctured by the sounds of Kita’s shears at work. It feels like Atsumu is brimming with questions, but Kita is patient, enjoying the peace of the moment. He has learnt a lot today.  
  
Wordlessly, Atsumu holds out the last slice of peach out to him as he stares out into the yard. Kita smiles and shakes his head.  
  
“No, thank you.”  
  
Atsumu eats it, chewing slowly and savouring it. After a while, he sets the plate aside and pulls the bowl of rice crackers into his lap.  
  
“You know, you left snacks out so often, I always assumed you wanted something in return, but you’ve never asked for anything,” he says. He peers over at Kita shrewdly. “What is it you want, Kita-san?”  
  
Kita, stripping away some half-dried leaves off a lily’s stem, stops and looks back at him, a little surprised. “Nothing,” he says. “I… never thought about it, actually. I just left snacks out because I liked the idea of doing so.”  
  
“No one wants _nothing_ ,” says Atsumu impatiently.  
  
“I’ve been leaving snacks out since I was fifteen, and nothing’s changed,” says Kita. “Isn’t that okay?”  
  
Atsumu frowns. “You really have nothing you’d like?”  
  
Kita shrugs, gathering the dried leaves and setting them aside. “I suppose… I’d like my family and friends to stay healthy and live long lives.”  
  
Atsumu makes a sound like a part-groan, part-yell, part-laugh.  
  
“Of _course_ you would!” he says. “That’s very like you, Kita Shinsuke-san. For better or for worse, there’s not a lot I can do in that regard, but I suppose if anyone deserves that sort of happiness…” He sighs, lets his gaze fall to the now-empty bowl in his lap. “Ah, I’m done.”  
  
Kita looks up as Atsumu sets the bowl down and stands. “Are you going home, now?”  
  
“Mm. I have been out all day.”  
  
“Do you have any snacks you’d like to eat tonight?”  
  
Atsumu looks at him, and Kita thinks that his expression softens a little. “I have already been fed. Thank you for the food, Kita-san.”  
  
And with that, Atsumu steps out into the yard, leaps onto the ledge of the wall, easy as breathing, and jumps off, out of sight.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Atsumu coming over for snacks when Kita sits outside, studying for university or doing his chores, becomes something of a regular occurrence, so much so that Kita doesn’t leave food out at night anymore.  
  
It’s through these meetings that Kita slowly learns more about him. He learns that Atsumu will eat almost anything, with the beansprouts being the most glaring exception. He likes almost all fruits, too, but had looked disappointedly at the bowl of sliced mango Kita had prepared one day. Kita had snickered and eaten the mango himself, leaving Atsumu to munch happily on a packet of pizza-flavoured Pretz.  
  
He learns that Atsumu, when he is set on something, is the type to speak his mind and care little about who he might burn in the process. His circle of fox spirits don’t let him get away with too much trash-talking, though, least of all his ‘pain of a brother’, and know how to deal with Atsumu when he is being particularly difficult. He learns that Atsumu is quietly, quietly grateful for it all.  
  
He talks a bit about the other foxes in his group: _Aran_ , sometimes bossy but with a reassuring presence, and fun to tease; _Akagi_ , ever-friendly and hard-working; _Oomimi_ , reliable, but hard to tell what he’s thinking sometimes; _Ginjima_ , not a mean bone in his body; _Suna_ , fun to joke with, but he is not to be trusted; _Kosaku_ , should relax every now and then, but he’s reliable too; _Riseki_ , kind but needs to believe in himself more; _Osamu_ , Atsumu’s twin, deceivingly soft-hearted, easier for people to talk to and get along with, and Atsumu will never admit it, but Osamu knows him best, and Atsumu breathes a little easier when he is around.  
  
Well, Atsumu hasn’t explicitly said all that about him, but it’s what Kita can determine, based off what he has been told. He wonders if the other foxes know about the Kita household, but has a feeling that it is something Atsumu doesn’t bring up around them.  
  
“Calligraphy?” says Atsumu one day when he pops into the yard. It’s a beautiful, warm day, and Kita is outside on the porch with a low table in front of him, upon which is paper, brushes, a small inkstone, a book of writings, and a bottle of ink beside it. “I didn’t know you write! How did I not know that?”  
  
“Maybe because I usually write in my room,” says Kita. “But it’s too nice out to stay inside, and I don’t have any classes today.”  
  
“Who taught you?”  
  
“I learnt in high school for a while. This became a hobby, mostly, but I find it relaxing, so I write when I can.”  
  
Atsumu settles beside him and takes the box of chocolate biscuits Kita has for him today. He peers over at the paper, at the characters already written. “Ooh… these are quite lovely. Are they for anything special?”  
  
“No, I’m just practising. Can you write, too?”  
  
“I can.” _Crunch_ , goes the first biscuit. “Don’t you use inksticks? Do humans not use those, these days?”  
  
“When I’m practising, I use bottled ink,” Kita answers. “I use inksticks when I’m writing for more special occasions. Would you like to write something?”  
  
Atsumu thinks for a long moment, eyes following Kita’s brush, inkstone to paper, writing the character for ‘sound’. He seems a bit subdued today, Kita notes.  
  
“Mm… no,” Atsumu says. “I’d rather watch you.”  
  
“Do your friends know you’re here today?”  
  
“Nope. ‘Samu’s being a pain, so I’m hiding.”  
  
Kita fights back a little smile as he sets his finished calligraphy aside, and pulls his book towards him, finding another poem to copy down. “Atsumu, did you do something?”  
  
“What? No! I just… I mean… it’s not…” Atsumu munches on another biscuit, sulkily now. “I ate his daifuku this morning. I guess he’d been looking forward to it. He yelled at me, and I ran off.”  
  
“Ah.”  
  
“I was _hungry_.”  
  
“Atsumu.”  
  
“Breakfast wasn’t ready yet.”  
  
“Atsumu.”  
  
Atsumu looks forlornly down at the box of biscuits in his hands. After a moment, he makes a noise like ‘ _hhrgmrgmh_ ’, and closes the box.  
  
“I’ll take these to him,” he mumbles, pushing it aside and tucking his knees close to his chin.  
  
Kita begins copying his chosen poem down, writing it more artistically than in the book.  
  
“Have you had a proper meal yet, Atsumu?” he asks.  
  
“No,” Atsumu answers. “I ran away before breakfast.”  
  
“It’s almost time for lunch. If your group is eating together, you should eat with them. It’d be a good time to apologise to your brother, too.”  
  
Atsumu scrunches up his face. “I’m not going to _apologi_ —”  
  
“Apologise in your own way, I mean,” says Kita patiently, brush trailing along the paper and connecting the characters together. He is dissatisfied with the way he has written ‘ocean’. “I can’t tell you how to speak to your own brother, but the longer you leave it, the worse it’ll be.”  
  
He knows he is right, knows Atsumu agrees, no matter how much he doesn’t want to. Atsumu silently continues watching him write, until Kita has finished the poem and sets his brush down. He’ll practice the character for ‘ocean’ a few times, he thinks. As Kita adds more ink to his inkstone, Atsumu untangles his limbs and stands up.  
  
“Thank you for the food, Kita-san,” he says, more politely and quieter than usual.  
  
“Feel free to come back later,” says Kita, though he knows he won’t.  
  
Atsumu takes the box of chocolate biscuits and tucks it into the sleeve of his haori, and exits nimbly over the garden wall as usual.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

A few days later, Kita has just returned from his university classes, and as he steps out into his backyard, he spots a young man he has never seen before, sitting cross-legged on the ledge of the wall with an ease that cannot be human. Kita’s first thought is that he, too, is a fox spirit—he has a distinctively _fox-like_ look about him, a similar feel to Atsumu, in a way. This fox spirit has a slim build, with black hair and narrow, cunning eyes, and he is wearing a warm-grey kosode, a black hakama, and a beige haori with red and orange autumn leaves running along the edges. When Kita meets his eyes, the fox tenses and straightens his back abruptly, like he’s ready to flee, when—  
  
“ _Suna!_ There you are!”  
  
The fox spirit—Suna—yelps and jumps about a mile and looks indignantly behind him. First, there are hands, grabbing onto the wall’s ledge, and then another face pops up over it. Kita has never seen him before, either.  
  
Well—that’s not quite right. He has never seen him before, but Kita knows his face’s mirror image well—without a doubt, he is Atsumu’s twin brother.  
  
“You scared me!” Suna hisses, cuffing Atsumu’s twin— _Osamu_ , wasn’t it?—over his head.  
  
“What’s got you so worked up—oh!” Osamu spots Kita, and ducks a little. “I think he can see us.”  
  
“If you’re looking for Atsumu,” Kita calls out, “I haven’t seen him all day.”  
  
Suna and Osamu exchange glances.  
  
“We aren’t looking for him,” says Suna, visibly relaxing, as Osamu pulls himself up onto the wall’s ledge and perches beside him. “I was just passing through when I caught his scent here. Is this where he’s been hiding all this time?”  
  
“He occasionally comes by, yes,” says Kita slowly.  
  
Suna tilts his head to the side curiously. “What’s there to do here?”  
  
“You are so rude,” says Osamu. “Just like ‘Tsumu.”  
  
“I don’t want to hear that from _you_ , of _all_ —”  
  
“This is the Kita household,” Osamu says loudly, looking over at Kita, “isn’t it? I haven’t stopped by here since you were born. You’re the grandson of the lady who used to make the really delicious dorayaki?”  
  
“That’s right,” says Kita.  
  
Osamu nods. “You look like her. Is she well?”  
  
“She is.”  
  
“That’s good to hear.”  
  
(Soft-hearted, easier for people to talk to.)  
  
“I remember you and Atsumu used to fight for her dorayaki.” Suna shakes his head. “Not much has changed.”  
  
“You don’t exactly _stop_ our fights, you know,” Osamu points out. “In fact, you _encourage_ them, half the time.”  
  
Suna just hums and looks pleased with himself.  
  
“Is there something I can help you with?” Kita asks.  
  
“Just saying hello,” says Osamu. “I’ve noticed ‘Tsumu seems a little more cheerful these days. I think I know why, now.”  
  
“Speaking of…” says Suna.  
  
Osamu looks at him. “Wh—“  
  
“ _What are you two doing here?!_ ”  
  
Startled, Osamu falls off the wall’s ledge and tumbles into the yard at the sound of Atsumu’s shouting. Atsumu’s face appears over the wall, looking deeply annoyed. Beside him, Suna is cackling.  
  
“Was that _necessary?!_ ” Osamu shouts back, looking up and rubbing his head. “We just stopped by to say hello!”  
  
Atsumu pulls himself up on the wall, squinting suspiciously down at him, and then back up at Suna. “Kita-san, were they bothering you?”  
  
“Kita- _san_ ,” Osamu repeats dryly. “Isn’t that a bit casual?”  
  
“It’s fine,” says Kita with a wave of his hand. “You don’t need to be so formal with me.”  
  
“Kita-san, if these two were giving you trouble, I’ll teach them a lesson,” says Atsumu, and he actually looks ready to pounce on either of them.  
  
“Oh, like you could do anything,” says Suna, scoffing  
  
“Excuse me! I could beat you in a fight, and you know it!” says Atsumu.  
  
“Osamu, you’re on my side, right?”  
  
“Absolutely not.”  
  
“ _What!_ ”  
  
“Would you all,” says Kita, and the three stop bickering to look over at him, “like some tea? I have some rice crackers, too.”  
  
Atsumu pouts, but Osamu and Suna perk up, and a handful of minutes later, all four of them are sitting on the porch, each holding a cup of roasted tea, with a teapot and a bowl of rice crackers between them.  
  
“Mmm, delicious,” says Osamu with an appreciative sip. “I haven’t had human’s tea for a while.”  
  
“It’s not bad for human’s tea, either,” says Suna. When Osamu shoots him a pointed look, Suna smiles into his cup and says, “I’m joking. It’s very nice.”  
  
Atsumu sits beside Kita, more closely than he usually would. Kita wonders whether this clinginess is because he is feeling particularly protective, or perhaps a bit jealous, even. He thinks he may have been right in thinking that until now, the Kita household had been something like Atsumu’s secret.  
  
Kita nudges the bowl of rice crackers towards him, and when Atsumu’s eyes flicker in his direction, his expression softens. Osamu slurps his tea, shrewdly. Suna looks between all three of them and rolls his eyes.  
  
They chat. Osamu and Suna don’t ask much about Kita himself—he is reminded of lines not being crossed—but instead reminisce about his great-grandparents. Kita knew that his great-grandfather was an excellent calligrapher himself, and that his great-grandmother used to run a popular snack stand, but he learns more: that his great-grandfather was a shy and quiet man, and used to enjoy tea and sake with the spirits too, rather like they were doing right now; that his great-grandmother came across as tough, but had a soft spot for the less fortunate children in the neighbourhood; that the two of them didn’t get along at first due to clashing personalities, but eventually came to understand each other, brought out the best in each other, and fell in love.  
  
There is a fondness in the way the foxes speak about them, and by the time the tea and rice crackers are gone, Kita finds himself feeling disappointed, wishing he knew more.  
  
“It’s getting late,” says Suna, looking up at the afternoon sky. “We should head home and help out with dinner preparations.”  
  
Osamu sets his teacup down. “We’ve taken up a lot of your afternoon, Kita-san. Is that all right?”  
  
Kita nods. He had planned to do some extra readings for university, but he wasn’t behind on coursework. “It’s fine. I enjoyed hearing about my great-grandparents, so thank you. You can leave the cups, I’ll clear those.”  
  
Suna and Osamu stand and stretch comfortably, and Atsumu moves to follow them, but Kita puts a hand on his arm, and he stills.  
  
“I just wanted a word with Atsumu,” says Kita. Suna and Osamu exchange looks and shrug.  
  
“You can keep him as long as you like, honestly,” says Osamu says, and Atsumu pulls a face at him while Suna snickers.  
  
“Let’s go,” says Suna. “Kita-san, thank you for the tea and food.”  
  
“Thank you, Kita-san,” says Osamu.  
  
Kita and Atsumu watch as they leave the garden and jump over the wall, agile as flying, haori disappearing out of sight in flashes of colour. Kita turns to Atsumu, who blinks curiously at him.  
  
“Today, I learnt a lot about my great-grandparents,” says Kita, “but I also learnt a little about you—about your life outside of this garden. I’m grateful for that, too.”  
  
Atsumu drops his gaze. His fingers tap against the porch absently, and he looks slightly sheepish, with a ghost of a pout still tracing his lips.  
  
Kita adds, “I thought that you might’ve been lonely, which was why you came here so often,” and at this, Atsumu shakes his head.  
  
“I have learnt that there is a difference,” he says slowly, “between _being lonely_ , and wanting to _be alone._ I like my circle, but I like being alone sometimes.”  
  
“I’m glad that’s all it is,” says Kita. Atsumu pulls his hands back, slips them into the sleeves of his haori, and ducks his head.  
  
“I like coming here,” he says in a mumble more than anything, his cheeks tinging slightly pink. “I like your company.”  
  
When Kita smiles at him, Atsumu’s face turns even pinker, and he abruptly turns away.  
  
“Anyway, I—I should head home,” he says. “‘Samu says what he says, but he’ll give me an earful if I don’t help out with dinner.”  
  
“Will you stop here by later this week?” Kita asks.  
  
Atsumu nods and stands. “I will. Thank you for today, Kita-san.”  
  
“See you soon, Atsumu.”  
  
And with that, Atsumu hurries away, over the wall of the garden, the colour of his golden hair flashing in the afternoon sun.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Kita is sitting on the porch, typing away at his university essay on his laptop with two textbooks, a notebook, and some photocopies by his side, and two pieces of inari sushi on a plate by his other side. From the corner of his eye, he can see Atsumu spring over the wall and make a beeline for the sushi.  
  
“Good afternoon, Atsumu.”  
  
“Hello,” says Atsumu around a mouthful of inari sushi.  
  
It’s another ordinary day in the garden. The weather is starting to cool down this time of year, but Kita still tries to do whatever work he has outside as often as he can. It has become a habit, a comfort of sorts; a small part of him wonders how much of that has to do with Atsumu.  
  
“My friends and I are holding a banquet tomorrow night. Would you like to join us, Kita-san?”  
  
Kita looks up from his laptop and stares at him; Atsumu is licking his fingers contently, the inari sushi all gone. “A banquet?”  
  
Atsumu nods eagerly. “With our circle, and we’re inviting our friends! Fox’s sake is the best, and our food is _incomparable_.”  
  
“I’m still under twenty-one years old; I can’t legally drink alcohol until next year.”  
  
“ _Ugh_ ,” says Atsumu.  
  
“What’s the occasion?” Kita resumes his typing.  
  
“No occasion; it’s just an informal thing because it’s been a while, and we felt like it.”  
  
“I’m a human, though; is that okay?”  
  
Atsumu shrugs. “You _probably_ won’t die—you’re too scrawny to make a filling meal. But, bring your granny’s dorayaki, and you’ll _probably_ be fine.”  
  
“Ah, I knew it, you’re just using me for food again.”  
  
“Naturally.” Atsumu grins. “But, really—as our guest, you would be safe. What do you say, Kita-san?”  
  
Kita stops typing again and stares unseeingly at his screen. Curious as he is, there is doubtlessly a literal a world of difference between a human’s banquet and a banquet for spirits. Was it really safe? Would he be inviting trouble by going?  
  
Atsumu seems to notice his hesitation, and leans in to nudge him.  
  
“Kita-san,” he says, “I wouldn’t be inviting you if I thought it’d be dangerous. After all, who would give me more pudding?”  
  
Something like relief settles in Kita’s chest, and he exhales softly; it’s a good enough reassurance as any. He smiles and reaches over to ruffle Atsumu’s hair.  
  
“All right,” he says. “Thank you. Where should I go?”  
  
Atsumu brightens. He reaches into the sleeve of his haori and pulls out a folded piece of paper. “I drew you a map! It’s easier this way. But don’t lose it, or you won’t be able to get inside. To human eyes, our place looks like a big, old abandoned house, but while this is with you, you can see it for what it really is!”  
  
Kita takes the map and looks at it quickly, just in case it is completely ineligible—ah, nope, it’s a perfectly fine and coherent map after all. He breathes a sigh of relief.  
  
“ _Kita-san_ ,” Atsumu complains.  
  
“I was just being careful,” Kita replies. “I don’t want to get lost. Thank you; I’m looking forward to it.”  
  
“ _Hmph_.” Atsumu pulls a sulky face at him. “Maybe we should eat you after all.”  
  
“If you like,” says Kita. He ruffles Atsumu’s hair again, and Atsumu looks ready to protest, but eventually, the sulkiness fades from his face, until he is leaning contently into Kita’s touch.  
  
“All right, I have to finish this essay as soon as I can, if I’m going to the banquet tomorrow,” says Kita, pulling his hand away. Atsumu looks disappointed. “When should I get there?”  
  
“Any time after sundown,” says Atsumu.  
  
“All right. I’ll see you tomorrow, then?”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
Kita turns a page in his textbook and rifles through his stack of photocopied notes, before typing a few more lines of his essay. Atsumu still hasn’t moved from his spot, but Kita assumes he’s simply taking his time and enjoying the quietness.  
  
That is, until Atsumu leans over and takes his arm, and then sets Kita’s hand on his head. After a moment of surprised silence, Kita gives a little huff of laughter, and ruffles his hair again.  
  
Atsumu eventually pulls away, apparently satisfied. He stands, thanks Kita for the food, and leaves the garden.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

That evening, over dinner, Kita tells his grandmother.  
  
“Granny, tomorrow night, I won’t be home for dinner. I’m…” Kita hesitates. _She doesn’t need to see them, in order to believe in them_. “I have been invited to a fox’s banquet.”  
  
His grandmother looks surprised, and Kita holds his breath and braces himself to be told he cannot go—because foxes are infamous tricksters, are they not? Would he be safe going, how did he know these foxes, who invited him, where is the banquet held? He had thought about lying to her, or giving her half-truths such as _I’m having dinner with a friend and I’ll be home late_ , but it feels wrong to tell her lies this big; he has avoided doing so all his life.  
  
But then, her face eases into a smile, and Kita breathes.  
  
“Your grandfather had a nice set of traditional clothes that I think would look good on you,” she says. “Would you like to wear them?”  
  
“Yes, please. Thank you,” says Kita. He pauses, remembers what else Atsumu had mentioned, and then adds, “Granny… could you also make some dorayaki for me to bring?”  
  
She looks confused. “Dorayaki? To a banquet?”  
  
“I was told your dorayaki were very popular.”  
  
“Were they!” His grandmother laughs, soft. “Well, then, how could I turn down such a request? I’ll make them right before you head off, so they’ll be nice and fresh.”  
  
Kita smiles. “Thanks, granny.”  
  
A small part of Kita is tempted to invite her along—to meet the fox spirits who enjoyed what she had to give, to somehow let her see this bit of colour added to Kita’s world, to let them properly meet his dear grandmother, who was among the kindest of people Kita ever knew…  
  
But, kind as she was, having her attend a fox’s event she had not been invited to… Kita knew, deep down, it would be more trouble than he could manage. He would enjoy the banquet on his grandmother’s behalf, and that would be the best he could do—that would be enough.  
  
By the lack of questions she asks, it seems she understands the same thing.  
  
The next evening, dressed in a black kosode, a carefully pressed dark grey hakama, and a fine red haori with a faint straight-lined pattern crossing all over it, Kita sets out with a large plate of warm dorayaki covered with cling-wrap balanced carefully in one hand, and Atsumu’s map in the other.  
  
To be perfectly honest, Atsumu had not seemed the type to have such nice handwriting. The characters he had written on the map were neat and practised, and the lines showing Kita where to go were clear and careful. Kita wondered about what foxes do—whether they, too, dabbled in penmanship and the arts, and whether Atsumu had learnt them. Perhaps he would ask about this.  
  
Up ahead, Kita can see the banquet’s venue, and like Atsumu had said, it looks like an old abandoned house from afar, but as he draws closer, it lights up and looks less and less run down with every step he takes, until Kita is standing before a house that feels grander than any other he has seen in the area. It is by no means the biggest, but it’s still able to take Kita’s breath away in its own manner. Every wooden piece of the house looks clean, polished, new; lanterns have been hung up in a kaleidoscope of colour; the gardens look impeccable. Through the open doors, he can hear laughter and the clinking of tableware.  
  
Kita takes a deep breath and tucks Atsumu’s map into his sleeve. So he is here, at a fox’s banquet. It is completely foreign to him, but oddly enough, he is not nervous.  
  
He steps up to the main entrance, and almost right away, Atsumu appears before him, dressed in a dark red kimono and a black haori patterned with large grey chrysanthemums. Red make-up lines his eyes, and he also has what looks like a swirl of a red will-o’-the-wisp painted on his forehead.  
  
“You made it!” he calls out delightedly. “Kita-san, we match!”  
  
Kita’s face softens into a smile as he slips off his shoes. “We do.”  
  
“And is that—”  
  
When Kita lifts up the plate in his hands, Atsumu bursts into laughter.  
  
“Dorayaki!” he exclaims. “You actually brought some!”  
  
“They were made by my granny,” says Kita. “It might seem out of place, but…”  
  
“No! No, no.” Atsumu takes the plate off his hands and ushers him inside, still beaming, bright as the sun. “Your granny’s dorayaki is famous in our circle! I just didn’t think you’d _actually_ bring some.”  
  
Inside the large main room where they are to eat, tatami mats line the floor perfectly neatly; two dozen low tables, each with an accompanying square cushion, are arranged in a large U-shape with space in the middle for what Kita assumes is for entertainment; a handful of small ceramic bowls and dishes grace each table, filled with beautifully arranged and colourful food; already seated at most of the tables are the guests, all of whom assume a human’s appearance, but if Kita doesn’t look too carefully, he can see, from the corners of his eyes, the swish of the occasional tail, the adjusting of wings, unusually long fingernails, scaly skin, horns…  
  
“Kita-san!”  
  
Osamu darts over to them, peering over Atsumu’s shoulder at the plate he is holding. Like Atsumu, Osamu is also wearing a black haori, but his is patterned with dark grey stripes, and his kimono is dark blue. He, too, has thin lines of red make-up around his eyes, and a long oval running down the middle of his forehead.  
  
“Is that— _dorayaki?_ ”  
  
“Get off me, ‘Samu!”  
  
“My granny made them,” says Kita, and Osamu’s eyes widen. “I’m not sure how you want to distribute them, but—”  
  
“Everyone will have one for dessert, of course!” says Atsumu. “Most of us know your granny’s dorayaki, so this will be perfect.”  
  
“I’ll take them to the kitchen,” says Osamu.  
  
“No, you will _not_ ,” Atsumu retorts. “If you take them, they’ll be gone by the time you even make it inside. I’ll take them—”  
  
“You’re not any better!”  
  
“—and you show Kita-san to his seat!”  
  
“ _Ugh_ , fine. Kita-san, this way.”  
  
Atsumu pulls a face at him and leaves the room. Kita follows Osamu, who seats him next to _Aran-kun_ , the unofficial leader of the foxes’ circle, and who smiles warmly at Kita.  
  
“It’s nothing so formal,” says Aran with a wave of his hand as Kita nods in greeting, and Osamu hurries away so he can refill some guests’ sake cups. “We’re all simply good friends. But having said that, thank you for looking after our Atsumu. He must be giving you a lot of trouble.”  
  
“No trouble,” says Kita with a smile. “I’ve really enjoyed his company, actually.”  
  
“He hasn’t mentioned you much, Kita-sama,” says the one seated on Aran’s other side— _Akagi_. “You’re like a secret, but he’s more cheerful these days, so thank you.”  
  
“Please, help yourself,” says the other fox spirit seated next to Akagi— _Oomimi_. “We’re looking forward to eating your grandmother’s dorayaki again after so long, but there’s plenty more food if you are still hungry.”  
  
“Thank you for the meal,” says Kita with a grateful nod, and he begins eating.  
  
The food really is delicious—rice, fish, both picked and steamed vegetables, mushrooms, thin slices of meat, fruit on the side—with everything being the perfect balance of flavour. This had apparently been Oomimi’s and Akagi’s handiwork, and they were proud to point this out.  
  
Kita eventually meets the rest of their circle: _Ginjima, Kosaku, Riseki._ They hurry back and forth to eat a few bites of their meals before scuttling off to refill drinks for guests. Kita has barely seen Atsumu and Osamu since arriving, and he has seen no sight of Suna.  
  
“Atsumu and Osamu are helping him get ready, but he’s almost done,” Aran explains when Kita asks. “He’ll be performing a dance—a bit different to humans’ dances, I think. Nothing too fancy.”  
  
“Suna? A dance?” says Kita with raised eyebrows.  
  
Aran grins. “He doesn’t seem the type, does he?”  
  
“Well…”  
  
“Don’t worry, everyone thinks the same thing. But our Suna likes surprising guests.”  
  
“Now, that, I can see.”  
  
“Ha!” Aran raises his sake cup appreciatively, and Kita, likewise, raises his cup of tea.  
  
Almost half-way through the dinner, Atsumu finally joins Kita by his table.  
  
“Are you having a good time?” he asks with an eager smile, and Kita nods.  
  
“I am. How about you, Atsumu? Have you eaten?”  
  
“I’m fine, most of us ate a bit before the banquet because we knew we’d be busy,” says Atsumu. He leans in and adds, quieter, “I’m glad you could make it, Kita-san.”  
  
Kita smiles. “Thank you for inviting me.”  
  
Atsumu’s face flushes pink. “It’s like you said… I wanted to show you a little more of my life outside of your garden. I thought this might be a good opportunity.”  
  
“It is,” says Kita. “Thank you.”  
  
Atsumu is about to respond, when Oomimi taps his shoulder and says, “It’s almost time.”  
  
“Oh!” Atsumu jumps to his feet. “Kita-san, I’ll be right back!”  
  
“What are—”  
  
But he dashes off.  
  
“Little show-off,” says Oomimi as he kneels by Kita’s table to refill his teacup. Kita doesn’t miss the fondness in his voice. “Suna will be performing a dance, and Atsumu and Osamu will be playing the koto and shakuhachi with him.”  
  
“Oh,” says Kita. “I had no idea they played. Atsumu never mentioned anything.”  
  
“Atsumu is funny like that, sometimes,” says Oomimi, nodding. “He doesn’t open up very easily to strangers, but when he is close to someone, he speaks quite freely. Maybe it was just a matter of time.” He pauses. “Maybe he was just keeping it secret so he could surprise you.”  
  
Aran makes his way into the space at the opening of the table arrangement, and clears his throat. At once, the lively room shushes in anticipation, and everyone gives him their rapt attention.  
  
“We thank you deeply for joining us tonight,” says Aran. “It’s always wonderful to share an evening with our friends like this. Please, continue eating, but while you do so, we will present dancing and some music for your entertainment. Relax, and enjoy.” And he bows and moves away, back to his seat.  
  
Atsumu and Osamu re-enter the room and move into the space he has left; Atsumu sets a beautiful thirteen-string koto down on the floor and kneels before it, and Osamu remains standing, holding a long, thick bamboo flute. Suna enters after them, and Kita finds him almost unrecognisable from the cheeky fox who had been perched on his garden wall not long ago. He walks slowly into the middle of the space between the tables, looking stoic and holding himself up with a properness that Kita has a feeling must be stifling for someone like him—and by the soft snickers from Aran and Akagi, he might be right.  
  
Suna looks stunning. He is wearing a white-to-grey gradient hakama with a faint diamond pattern, and a plain grey kosode, but his decorative haori, while beautiful, is more unusual, with longer sleeves than normal, and features white cranes in flight alongside large, colourful flowers. Red make-up lines his eyes and forehead, more artistically and intricately than that of the others, and two long, thin strings of flowers pinned into his hair trail down his left shoulder. In each hand, he is holding a fan, both half-gold and half-red.  
  
He bows to the silent room of guests, and Kita realises that he has been holding his breath. Osamu raises his flute to his lips and blows, a steady first note, and Kita exhales; he thinks he can feel the rest of the room doing so, too. When Atsumu plucks the first few notes of his koto, Suna raises one fan to his face, and begins his dance.  
  
The song is slow and has a melancholy touch to it; Kita is unfamiliar with it, but it seems the spirits know it better—he can see one of the spirits with horns press her hands over her chest and gasp softly as she recognises the tune.  
  
Suna is graceful, and Kita finds himself forgetting why he would ever think otherwise. He steps, spins, and dips, his fans waving in his hands and his haori fluttering around him like it’s made of light rather than fabric. Here, he is colour and elegance, capturing the attention of the entire room.  
  
But it is Atsumu whom Kita finds himself watching, almost as much as Suna; Atsumu, lost in the music, expression subdued, head bowed and fingers plucking agilely at the koto strings like it’s second nature to him, like it’s the only thing that matters in this moment. Kita is not one for playing musical instruments himself, but he can hear the years and years of practice Atsumu has put into it, the doubtless hours and hours of pouring his heart into getting this right. Atsumu does not raise his head even once during the song, the world apparently shut out, whereas Osamu’s eyes occasionally flicker up at Suna’s dancing form before him.  
  
The song ends to applause; there are tears in some spirits’ eyes. Suna’s face is covered by one of his fans again, and Atsumu and Osamu exchange glances and nod.  
  
The second song is much livelier, happier, and Suna dances faster, with more twirling of his fans and his haori flowing around him in a whirlwind of colour. More of the guests remember to continue eating now, sharing a laugh with their neighbour, and Kita eats too, finishing the rest of his meat and mushrooms, and picking slowly at his vegetables. As he eats, he chats a little with the snake spirit sitting next to him who travelled the country and specialised in selling medicines for spirits, and later, with a tanuki who came from a family of tea merchants.  
  
All the while, Atsumu is exactly the same, skilfully playing his koto like it’s the only thing happening in the world. Twice, Suna moves to dance closer to the twins and wave a fan in their direction, smirking and reminding Kita more of the first time they had met; he can see the smile in Osamu’s eyes, but Atsumu pays them no mind.  
  
The applause is louder when this song ends, and Suna bows deeply to the guests, before leaving the room. Atsumu gently pushes his koto to the side and stands, and Osamu tucks his shakuhachi back into a pouch he had kept in his sleeve.  
  
“Kita-san!” says Atsumu, joining him by his table again. “What did you think? Did you like it?”  
  
“I did, it was beautiful,” says Kita. “You never mentioned anything about playing the koto before.”  
  
Atsumu shrugs and looks a bit sheepish when he says, “I wanted to surprise you.”  
  
Kita smiles. “I was very moved. It’s obvious you put a lot of heart into it.” Atsumu brightens and flushes pink in the cheeks.  
  
“What did you think about ‘Samu’s shakuhachi playing? He wasn’t interested in learning it at first, until I convinced him to ages ago—”  
  
“ _Excuse me_ , ‘Tsumu, but that’s not how _I_ remember it.” Osamu appears abruptly and sits beside them, squinting at Atsumu. “We both played the koto first, but I was better—”  
  
“You were _not_.”  
  
“—so you kept practising, but then I started learning the shakuhachi, and we just stuck with those.” Osamu looks over at Kita and says, “‘Tsumu doesn’t have the breathing stamina to play any sort of flute.”  
  
Atsumu opens his mouth, ready to protest, when another voice says, “You know, Osamu, when you started learning the shakuhachi, you looked like a chicken bobbing its head.”  
  
They look up to see Suna standing above them, leaning down with his hands on his hips. He has replaced his colourful haori with a plain black one and removed the strings of flowers from his hair, but his intricate red make-up still lines his face. He is smirking again; Osamu swipes at him playfully.  
  
“I enjoyed watching you all,” says Kita. “Thank you for sharing that.”  
  
“It’s fine, Suna likes showing off,” Osamu pipes up.  
  
“Like _you_ can talk,” Suna retorts.  
  
Somewhere further down the row of tables, one of the guests with wings calls for Suna, and he and Osamu head over to chat with them. Atsumu shuffles closer to Kita.  
  
“Do you have any requests for songs?” he asks, and Kita shakes his head.  
  
“I don’t think I know of any spirits’ songs.”  
  
“Then, I’ll play something else later. You’ll listen, won’t you?” says Atsumu.  
  
“Of course,” says Kita, and Atsumu beams at him. It’s a little bewildering, trying to connect him with the fox who had been playing the koto just a few minutes ago—that Atsumu could have such different expressions, from looking so serious and composed, to smiling like this, like he holds all the joy in the world.  
  
He learns a little more about Atsumu every time they meet. He is grateful for this.  
  
Over the course of the rest of the night, Atsumu plays two more songs: a solo piece with a sweet tune that makes Kita think of the end of spring and the start of summer, and then Kosaku joins him for a second song, playing a small flute that Kita doesn’t recognise. Later, Aran gives a skilled performance of his own, playing two songs on a shamisen, one of which is accompanied by Riseki, also playing a shakuhachi. Some of the guests dance in the middle of the room; Kita’s grandmother’s dorayaki is distributed on small plates to each guests’ table, and received very fondly; Osamu and Suna challenge each other to a drinking game, but it doesn’t last very long before the two of them have their heads together and are drunkenly whispering and giggling madly.  
  
It is almost one in the morning when Kita takes his leave. Atsumu sees him out.  
  
“Thank you for having me today,” Kita says, slipping his shoes back on.  
  
“Thanks for coming,” says Atsumu, smiling. “You’ll come again to the next one, right?”  
  
Kita smiles back. “I’d love to… as long as I don’t get eaten.”  
  
“Ha! I think we can work with that.”  
  
He waves, and Kita turns and begins to make his way home.  
  
Later, back in the comfort of his room and in his pajamas, tired but content, Kita lays Atsumu’s map beside his pillow and turns in for the day. In his sleep, he dreams of foxes dancing on koto strings, and cranes playing the shamisen.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

“Granny wants to know if you would like her to make more dorayaki,” says Kita. Atsumu, Aran, and Ginjma, who are visiting him a few days after the banquet, perk up, even though Aran attempts to be more subtle about it.  
  
“That’s very kind of her, but if she’s busy or tired, she shouldn’t worry about us,” says Aran.  
  
“I’ll ask her,” Kita offers.  
  
It’s another cool day, Kita has taken a break from studying, and the four of them are sitting on the porch together with some tea and a bowl of roasted chestnuts. Aran had insisted that they stop by with a box of a variety of homemade pickled vegetables, along with a small bottle of sake, to thank Kita’s grandmother.  
  
“Made by Akagi and myself,” Aran explains as Kita turns the beautiful dark brown ceramic bottle in his hands. “It’s not too strong, and it’s on the sweeter side—we figured your grandmother might like that better, but if not, let us know, and we’ll get you another sake.”  
  
“I think this will be perfect,” says Kita, smiling. “Thank you.”  
  
“This is so nostalgic! I haven’t been here in so long,” says Ginjima, looking around fondly. “Your great-grandfather and I used to play chess together, even though I was never very good at it. He tried to teach me all sorts of strategies, but honestly, I just enjoyed his company.”  
  
“You always used to try to get him to run around more,” says Aran, nodding. “But he was more bookish and more stubborn than most.”  
  
“Do you remember that time Suna stole one of his books and threatened to throw it into the river if he didn’t come out to try and stop him?” Atsumu asks with a grin.  
  
Ginjima laughs. “He just knelt down in the middle of the road until Suna gave up and returned it to him! I’ve ever seen Suna so _defeated_ before.”  
  
They continue to reminisce for a while, telling Kita stories of the mostly one-sided mischief they sometimes got up to with his great-grandfather, and it’s another nice, unhurried afternoon.  
  
Unfortunately, Kita has work to do, so…  
  
“Then, we won’t bother you anymore, Kita-sama,” says Aran with a grin when Kita tells them this apologetically. “Thanks for the chestnuts and tea.”  
  
“Please,” says Kita, “just ‘Kita’ is fine. I’m sorry to cut things short, but I really need to finish up some work today. You’re more than welcome to stop by another time if you like.”  
  
“No need for apologies,” says Aran, waving his hand, and they all begin to stand.  
  
“I was wondering,” Kita says, giving in to his curiosity, “can I visit you all? On a regular day, I mean. Is that possible?”  
  
At this, Atsumu looks at Aran eagerly; Aran rubs his chin, thinking.  
  
“I don’t see a problem with it,” he says. “It might be hard for humans to find us, though…”  
  
“I drew him a map,” says Atsumu, “but that one only worked for the banquet.”  
  
“We can see if there’s a spare pestle in the kitchens,” says Ginjima thoughtfully. “If it has a matching mortar, that should work, right?”  
  
“I’ll go have a look!” says Atsumu, and before the others can stop him, he dashes off, over the garden wall, a flick of a fox tail behind him.  
  
“ _Honestly_ ,” says Aran. Ginjima sighs, and Kita fights back a laugh. “He’d _live_ here if you aren’t careful, Kita.”  
  
He and Ginjima leave after thanking him again, and Kita takes their cups and bowl inside, but it’s not long before Atsumu returns, tapping the window leading from the garden into the back of the house.  
  
“What’s this about a mortar and pestle?” Kita asks as he steps out again.  
  
Atsumu grabs his hand and presses small, old wooden pestle into it, the end of which a piece of red string is threaded through a small hole.  
  
“The wood of this pestle was from a tree that grew in the mountains. Clay was taken from the soil that the tree grew on, and made into pottery for the mortar. They’re like a sibling set!” Atsumu steps back, looking pleased. “As long as we keep the mortar at the house, you can find us when you have the pestle with you.”  
  
“What? Is it really okay for me to have this?” asks Kita, staring down at the pestle. “It sounds important.”  
  
Atsumu’s smile falters. He drops his gaze and mumbles, “ _You_ are important, Kita-san.”  
  
“Atsumu—”  
  
“It’s fine, I swear. Oomimi-san was the one who said to give it to you; he said that he has some more stories he’d like to share about your great-grandfather, and to invite you over for tea sometime. So…” Atsumu looks up at him hopefully. “You’ll stop by, right?”  
  
It’s the first time Kita has received a material gift of sorts from the foxes. There was Atsumu’s map, of course, but that had felt more like a personal thing between just the two of them, given he hadn’t met most of other foxes at the time.  
  
They had given him much more though: stories of days long gone; a night where he saw for himself their hospitality, with music and dance and good food; warm company as the days grew colder; an invitation, welcoming him to spend more time with them.  
  
It was something he was looking forward to.  
  
“Of course I will,” says Kita, face softening into a smile as one hand curls around the pestle, and the other reaches for Atsumu’s head and ruffles his hair gently. “Thank you, Atsumu.”  
  
Atsumu’s cheeks turn pink, but obligingly, he bends his head, and Kita doesn’t miss the smile of his own that he is unable to hide.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

When Kita visits them the following week for lunch after his morning university class, with two boxes of palm-sized squid rice crackers in a bag in his hand, he does not expect to see a small blur shoot out of the house past him, and then for Atsumu to charge out after it and almost bowl Kita over, waving a broom and bellowing, “ _Don’t think I won’t skin you alive, you stupid rabbit!_ ”, followed closely by Osamu with another broom.  
  
“There are a certain group of rabbits who live over in the next ward,” Akagi explains cheerfully when Kita enters the household, politely bewildered. “Twice a year, they have initiation rituals, where the new rabbits will break into our house and try to steal something of ours. That one just then stole an old charm we received from a shrine. We’re actually friends with the rabbit leaders, and they always return whatever the young ones steal, but Atsumu and Osamu both hate losing, so they make it harder for them. Come on through—would you like some tea?”  
  
“Yes, please,” says Kita. “Thanks for having me over.”  
  
Akagi waves a hand. “Don’t be so polite! We love having company.”  
  
Aran and Ginjima fuss over the rice crackers, and then fuss some more over which tea they should bring out to drink with them, before Oomimi comes out from the kitchens and reminds them that they still have lunch waiting.  
  
“You lot always finish snacks too quickly. Why can’t you pace yourselves?” he chides them, and they have the grace to look _almost_ ashamed.  
  
The table they use is a large low one made from keyaki wood, with a dozen cushions of different colours and patterns scattered around it that everyone claims. The foxes bring out several bowls of rice and large dishes to the table; the food looks every bit as beautiful and delicious as from the banquet.  
  
Everyone is seated by the time the twins return from their rabbit-chasing; by the grumpy look on Atsumu’s face, and the dissatisfied expression on Osamu’s, it hadn’t been successful.  
  
“Oh! Kita-san,” says Osamu, and Atsumu starts, having just noticed him. “When did you get here?”  
  
“You two sprinted right past him when the rabbit took off,” says Akagi with a grin. “Didn’t even notice him! Come on, sit down, let’s eat already.”  
  
Atsumu quickly claims a spot next to Kita. Osamu rolls his eyes and takes a seat next to Kosaku.  
  
“Try the grilled fish, Kita,” says Oomimi, pointing to the second-largest dish. “Riseki caught it and cooked it today, and it looks perfect.” Beside him, Riseki chokes on a mouthful of rice and flushes bright red, and Kita smiles a little.  
  
“Thank you for the meal,” he says, and they all echo him, and dig in.  
  
They chat and eat and drink. It seems they and Kita have caught each other at a good time: the next day, Oomimi and Suna would travel up one of the mountains in order to purchase some medicinal herbs, of which everyone proclaimed Oomimi was an expert in handling, and Suna was something like his protégé; Aran would also be travelling with Osamu, Kosaku, and Riseki to the next prefecture for the day (“We’re just taking the train over,” Aran tells Kita) to greet and pay respects to the newly-appointed leader of a large group of tanuki that they were friendly with; Ginjima would be visiting some cousins who had just welcomed the birth of a daughter. This would leave just Akagi and Atsumu at the foxes’ house.  
  
“In case you’re wondering,” Akagi tells Kita, mock-seriously, “yes, I am worried Atsumu will accidentally set the house on fire the moment I’m not looking.”  
  
“AKAGI-SAN,” Atsumu protests loudly, and Suna chokes on his soup as he laughs. With an apologetic grin, Akagi uses his chopsticks to carry a large piece of fried chicken from the plate in the middle of the table over to a pouting Atsumu’s bowl.  
  
“There, there, Atsumu,” he says. “Think of all the delicious things we can have for lunch while the others aren’t here!”  
  
“Don’t you dare clear out the pantry, Akagi,” says Oomimi, setting down his teacup warningly, “or I’m going to be selling off a lot of your belongings to pay for food.”  
  
“Oh, don’t you worry about us.” Akagi winks at Atsumu, who grins back through a bite of fried chicken.  
  
“Please feel free to come over for lunch tomorrow,” Aran tells Kita. “You might be our last hope in saving the house from burning down.”  
  
“Sorry, I have classes all day tomorrow.”  
  
“Ahh, worth a try.”  
  
Akagi flicks a piece of mushroom that had fallen onto the table at Aran.  
  
When lunch is finished and the dishes and bowls are cleared away, Ginjima brings out some of the rice crackers Kita had brought over and pours them out onto a clean plate for everyone to share, and Kosaku refills everyone’s teacups. After a few more minutes of chatting, Kita and Atsumu take their teacups and a smaller plate with a few rice crackers on it, and move to the porch outside that faces the garden. The air is cool and crisp, and Kita clutches his warm teacup in his hands.  
  
“You’re not too torn-up over letting that rabbit escape, are you?” Kita asks as they sit, and Atsumu scoffs.  
  
“Of course not!” he says. “‘Samu and I went easy on him. We _let_ him go.”  
  
“Mm-hm.”  
  
“We could’ve _easily_ caught him, if we really wanted to.”  
  
“Mm…”  
  
Atsumu scowls and mutters “stupid rabbit” under his breath, and sips his tea crankily. Kita smiles and pushes the plate of rice crackers towards him.  
  
“Let it go, Atsumu.”  
  
“Hrrmgh.” Atsumu chomps down on a rice cracker. “This reminds me of a time when ‘Samu and I were chasing down another rabbit because she’d pinched one of my koto strings. Your great-grandfather also told me to let it go, back then. I sulked until he gave me some dango that your great-grandmother made.”  
  
Kita gives a little laugh. “That seems familiar, somehow.”  
  
“ _Kita-san_.” Atsumu pulls a face at him.  
  
“Do you miss them? My great-grandparents?” says Kita.  
  
“Hm… that’s hard to say…” Now pensively, Atsumu stares down at the teacup in his hands, running his thumb along the side. “Maybe?”  
  
“You all talk about them a lot,” Kita points out. “You always share memories of them.”  
  
“For you,” says Atsumu. “We talk about them for you, Kita-san.” He smiles and pushes his teacup to the side, and, not taking his eyes off him, tucks his knees close to himself.  
  
“We don’t need things like memories,” he continues. “Everyone has learnt this long ago. We always look to _today_ and _tomorrow_. This has always been our way. So… maybe I do miss your great-grandparents, but I can’t think about it too much.”  
  
Kita’s stomach gives a funny little swoop when he asks, “Would you miss me when I’m gone, then?”  
  
Now, Atsumu looks away, out into the garden.  
  
“I would,” says Atsumu. He keeps his voice casual, but the way the smile fades off his face says a little more. “But I’ve been around long enough to know that time is the greatest healer, and like all those before you, you will become a fond memory—a piece of the past—and I will move on.”  
  
“You don’t need things like memories,” Kita echoes.  
  
“Something like that,” says Atsumu, softer. “I think it’s a good philosophy to live by, but sometimes, I think it’s because we have no choice.”  
  
They fall into silence for a while. Atsumu picks up his teacup again and sips it delicately, and Kita follows. They pick at their rice crackers quietly.  
  
Kita thinks of living forever, of watching the world go by while time sits still—the vastness of it all, overwhelming if he thinks about it too much.  
  
He is a human, a mortal; it is not something for him to think about.  
  
He reaches out and ruffles Atsumu’s hair, and Atsumu ducks his head, flashing him a familiar little smile, and Kita holds onto this—thinks about this instead.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Winter arrives, and Kita falls sick in the first week with a fever, a bad cold, and his throat feeling like it’s being sliced open. It’s a bad time for it—he has two major assignments due soon. His grandmother fusses over him and gives him a bunch of home remedies like hot honey and lemon drinks, but they both know there’s not a lot he can do except to sleep it off.  
  
In the evening, Kita leaves a plate with a plump mandarin out for Atsumu, because it feels wrong to not do so. He hasn’t seen him in almost a week because he’d been doing his uni work and trying to fend off that dreaded growing soreness in his throat. He knows he can’t help it, knows he has to prioritise his health and school, but a nagging voice at the back of his mind hopes Atsumu isn’t upset with him.  
  
Kita tries to do some more work, but gives up when he runs out of honey and lemon tea. As he lies in his futon, he tosses and turns, unable to find a comfortable position to lie in; he hasn’t felt this sick in a long time. Eventually, he settles for lying on his side, and drifts in and out of sleep, being pulled between feeling too hot and feeling too cold. It’ll pass, and he knows this, but right now, a few minutes seems like hours.  
  
Sometime in the quiet of the night, someone tip-toes into his room and sits down beside him, and Kita, half-awake, knows it’s not his grandmother. He opens his eyes blearily to look up at the figure, and in the moonlight peeking through his curtains, he sees Atsumu staring down at him with a sombre look on his face.  
  
“You humans are so fragile,” he murmurs.  
  
_I’m sick, not dying,_ Kita wants to say. But then, Atsumu reaches out and gently places a cool hand on his hot forehead, and Kita closes his eyes and exhales.  
  
“Atsumu,” Kita croaks. He wants to apologise for worrying him, because why else would Atsumu come to his side like this? He wants to say sorry for not leaving snacks out like he used to, for not sitting with Atsumu and sharing a quiet moment together as they had always enjoyed, for not stopping by the foxes’ home with dorayaki, for—  
  
“Rest, Kita-san,” Atsumu whispers.  
  
He takes his hand away, and the air changes, and for a moment, Kita thinks Atsumu has disappeared. But he’s still here, just… not how Kita has known him all this time.  
  
Something much smaller steps towards his futon, and then, with bit of nudging and wriggling, burrows itself under his arms. Something like a dog, or a cat, or a…  
  
A fox.  
  
Even with his fever-addled brain, Kita vaguely notes that his fur is soft and smooth—is that normal for a fox? He’s never petted a fox before. He should ask sometime… but Atsumu is also not a normal fox, so would that even count? Ah, who knows…  
  
He can feel Atsumu’s even breathing, and curls his arms around him a little, tucking him slightly closer to his chest. Atsumu is warm, comforting, and there are words at the tip of Kita’s tongue, but before he can sort them into more comprehensive thoughts, he drifts off into steadier, dreamless sleep.  
  
When he wakes up the next morning, Atsumu is gone, and so is Kita’s fever and that feeling of knives in his throat. He still has his cold, but it’s much more manageable now.  
  
The mandarin Kita had left out is still on its plate when he goes to collect it.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Kita is fully recovered by the day after that; his grandmother is perplexed but relieved as she hands him another hot mug of honey and lemon tea, which Kita takes gratefully as he goes back to work on assignments. His head is mercifully clear now, and he’s never felt more grateful upon recovering from being sick.  
  
(More than once, he thinks about drifting off with a fox tucked up to his chest, and more than once, has to fix up his assignments when he’d accidentally typed the word “fox” where he shouldn’t have.)  
  
Later that afternoon, for a break and a stretch of his legs, he heads into the backyard and begins sweeping up the fallen leaves scattered around. It feels like he hasn’t done this for a long time. He takes a deep, welcome breath of crisp air.  
  
“Well, aren’t you chipper,” comes a familiar voice from the edge of the wall. Kita looks up and smiles.  
  
“Good afternoon, Atsumu.”  
  
“Lovely day, isn’t it?”  
  
“The sky looks like it might snow, soon.”  
  
“ _Sarcasm_ , Kita-san! You humans _invented_ it! Why am I, a fox, better at it than you?”  
  
Kita’s smile widens and shakes his head.  
  
“Thank you for staying with me the other night,” he says. Atsumu smirks down at him.  
  
“Eh? What are you talking about, Kita-san?” he says. “Did your fever make you hallucinate?”  
  
“Maybe,” says Kita. “But just in case, I’ve left out an extra pudding to thank y—”  
  
“WHERE?!”  
  
Without waiting for an answer, Atsumu zips down from the wall and makes a beeline for the plate sitting on the porch with two pudding cups on it, accompanied by a spoon. Kita can’t help but laugh as Atsumu digs into the first pudding greedily, a look of pure bliss on his face.  
  
Kita continues sweeping, and Atsumu watches him whilst eating his treats. It’s a beautiful day.  
  
(It doesn’t escape Kita’s attention that today, Atsumu had stopped to make sure he was all right before doing anything else. If it were any other day, Atsumu probably would’ve jumped for the food at first hello. Kita hides a smile, and doesn’t bring it up—a secret he keeps to himself.)

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

One slightly warmer winter day, while bundled up, Kita is sitting outside on the porch, practising his calligraphy and copying down some proverbs; his grandmother is sitting with him, sorting through some dried medicinal herbs she had just bought; Atsumu is sitting on the wall ledge, and has been watching them in silence for several minutes. This is unusual. He usually doesn’t hang around if Kita isn’t alone, and certainly not for this long…  
  
“Kita-san,” says Atsumu at last, and Kita’s eyes flicker in his direction. “Tell your granny not to go to the market tomorrow. There will be an accident. No one will be seriously hurt, but there will still be some small injuries.”  
  
At this, Kita blinks in surprise and stares at him. Seeing his message has been received, Atsumu stands and jumps down from the wall, and leaves without another word.  
  
“Shin-chan?” His grandmother’s voice causes him to start and look at her. “What are you looking at?”  
  
“Oh… no, I was just… thinking about…” says Kita with a vague wave of his hand at his paper. He doesn’t get much calligraphy done for the rest of the day, distracted by what Atsumu had told him.  
  
What excuses should he make? He could suggest his grandmother shop elsewhere for the week’s groceries, but everyone knows the market has the cheapest and freshest ingredients. He could invite her to go on a day trip with him, but he is still a student in the middle of university, and doesn’t have the money for too much. Maybe they could take the train over into the city to walk around… but his grandmother isn’t so fond of how bustling the city can be…  
  
Maybe…  
  
(Kita thinks about the foxes’ banquet: his grandfather’s clothes, lent without question; the plate of dorayaki, made without fuss; his grandmother’s smile, understanding; lies and half-truths dying on his tongue.)  
  
That evening, they prepare ingredients to make curry for dinner. His grandmother is cutting up the chicken, and Kita is peeling the potatoes and carrots.  
  
“Granny,” he says quietly. “Can you go to the market another day? Instead of tomorrow?”  
  
His grandmother stops. “Why’s that, Shin-chan?”  
  
Kita doesn’t answer right away as he begins cutting up the carrots, his knife a steady staccato against the chopping board.  
  
“I think,” he says slowly, “tomorrow isn’t a good day for it.”  
  
“Oh? Is the weather going to be bad?”  
  
“Not the weather,” says Kita. “Or, maybe it is? Either way… maybe you could go the day after, instead?”  
  
He can feel his grandmother staring at him, and he does not look back at her. Wordlessly, he finishes chopping up the carrots into even chunks, and gets to work on the potatoes.  
  
“All right,” his grandmother says, and Kita finally meets her eyes; she is smiling. “I’ll go to the market the day after. We still have enough groceries left for tomorrow’s dinner, anyway.”  
  
The next afternoon, they hear the news from a friend of Kita’s grandmother: a car had lost control and veered into two of the stalls at the edge of the market, after turning too fast around the corner and skidding on snow. Nobody was seriously injured outside of some scrapes and bruises, but the car’s hood and the two stalls had been left in a bad shape.  
  
“It’s a good thing you told me not to go to the market!” says Kita’s grandmother with a relieved smile, cupping Kita’s cheek with a hand. “The deities are watching, aren’t they?”  
  
Kita smiles back. From the corner of his eye, he thinks he can see a fox tail disappearing out of sight from the yard.  
  
“I think so,” he says.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Atsumu doesn’t show up at the garden over the next couple of days. Kita doesn’t think much of it, and continues on with his daily routines—going to university, doing assignments, occasionally having a cheap lunch out with friends, helping his grandmother around the house, practising his calligraphy.  
  
Almost two weeks later though, there’s still no sign of him, and Kita’s starting to worry. The snacks he’s left out haven’t been touched at all. No foxes stop by when he does his chores or sits outside to work…  
  
Is Atsumu okay?  
  
Kita tries not to think too much of anything bad that may have happened to him—he’s a fox spirit, did bad things happen to fox spirits?—but he makes up his mind to see for himself.  
  
On a morning when he’s not so busy, he takes the pestle the foxes had gifted him, tucks it into his pocket, and makes his way to the foxes’ house. But when he arrives, it isn’t the grand, well cared for residence he was more familiar with—it is run-down, seemingly abandoned, and empty, like how it had looked from afar on that night of the banquet. Kita frowns and inspects the pestle, but doesn’t find anything wrong with it, and it’s definitely the pestle he had been given. What had happened here?  
  
He steps onto the grounds of the house, on stray pebbles and untamed grass and patches of snow, and slowly walks around, keeping his ears opened to noise, but it is eerily quiet. Clutching the pestle in his fist, Kita takes off his shoes and enters through the main entrance, onto dusty tatami mats, and carefully steps around broken partitions, bits of broken ceramics, furniture that look like they haven’t been moved in years…  
  
He stands in the middle of the large room the foxes had held the lively banquet in, but feels nothing.  
  
“Atsumu?” he calls out. “Osamu? Suna? Aran? Are you there?”  
  
They are not.  
  
When he looks around for a little longer but finds nothing else, Kita leaves the house, feeling confused, and something like a sadness, a despair, not knowing what to do from here. Who could he ask for information? Spirits apparently found him too intimidating to go near. He had never seen others aside from the foxes, the spirits with whom he exchanged small-talk at the banquet, and that blur that had been the fleeing rabbit. He could try to find those spirits again, but where on earth could he even begin to look?  
  
He returns home and carries on with his day, but he thinks about the missing foxes and the abandoned house all the way until nighttime, when he’s in bed and cocooned in his blankets. He had left a plate of pudding out, but has a feeling he’d find it still there by morning. It’s cold tonight, and he thinks of Atsumu, tucked up beside him, warm and comfortable…  
  
He drifts off into an uneasy sleep, and doesn’t remember his dreams.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

The next morning, the pudding he had left out is indeed still there—but so is Osamu, sitting on the porch beside it. For a heart-stopping moment, Kita had thought he was Atsumu, and can’t help but feel disappointed he had been wrong, but at the sight of a fox spirit, he is relieved nonetheless. It is a strange mix of emotions.  
  
“May I eat this?” Osamu points to the pudding hopefully, and Kita gives a shaky little laugh.  
  
“Sure.” Kita sits down beside him, and watches as Osamu digs in, his blissful face identical to Atsumu’s when they are eating delicious food. There’s an odd clenching sensation in Kita’s chest, and he looks away.  
  
After a short while, Osamu puts down the plate and spoon, both licked clean, and looks out into the garden. It is snowing lightly outside, and he watches it fall with an almost serene expression on his usually deadpan face. He looks nothing like Atsumu.  
  
“Atsumu broke the mortar,” says Osamu at last, and Kita stares at him in surprise. “The mortar that came in a set with the pestle he gave you—he broke it and threw it out. That’s why you couldn’t see the house properly when you came by yesterday.”  
  
“You were there?” asks Kita. “I called for you.”  
  
Osamu nods. “And we heard you, but couldn’t call back. Things are different when you’re on the house grounds without the pestle—it’s a different space. I suppose it’s similar to being in a different world, if you consider the pestle to be like a key? It’s why we can speak here and now—we aren’t at our house.”  
  
“Did Atsumu break it on purpose?” Kita asks.  
  
“Yes.”  
  
“Is he all right?”  
  
“I’m not sure,” says Osamu. He tucks his hands into the sleeves of his haori and looks over at Kita with an expression that’s hard to read. “He told you to tell your granny not to go to the market, right?” When Kita nods, Osamu continues: “We fox spirits can sometimes predict future events; the older and more powerful among us can do it a little more often. But we don’t act upon these predictions—we are taught that life has its set paths, and that interfering could go badly, or at best, nothing would change. I suppose you’d call it destiny or fate.  
  
“No one knows if anything would have happened to your granny that day, but ‘Tsumu knows how important she is to you, and he acted upon it, just in case. But now that he’s done that, and now that you know, this opens the door for more problems: for example, there have been stories of spirits, or people possessed or influenced by spirits, who could tell the future and gained favour from it, only to have people turn against them when something bad happens and they don’t predict it, or if they don’t like the prediction. We know of friends who have been hurt before.  
  
“‘Tsumu… isn’t close to others outside of our circle. He keeps to himself.” Osamu purses his lips together for a moment as he collects his thoughts. “I’m not entirely sure why—maybe he doesn’t want to be hurt, but I think he just likes being by himself, mostly. He spends a lot of his time alone, sometimes playing the koto and practising calligraphy. You are one of the very few I know of who have gotten close to him over the years.  
  
“I think,” says Osamu, as Kita frowns, “‘Tsumu is worried that he won’t be able to tell you every time, and that you’ll hate him for it when things go badly. He was also worried about not telling you, and the possibility of your granny having injuries from the accident, and not being able to do anything about it.” He sighs and adds: “As much as I don’t like to admit it, ’Tsumu is a powerful spirit, but he’s not sure how that would affect you.”  
  
“Is that why he’s avoiding me?” says Kita quietly. Osamu nods.  
  
“You are very important to him, Kita-san… but he is scared and upset, and he is keeping his distance from you. That’s why he broke the mortar—he thinks it’s better this way.”  
  
“Is it, though?” Kita asks, and Osamu’s face softens into almost a smile. “Did you come here just to tell me this, Osamu?”  
  
Osamu pulls his hands from his haori sleeves, and opens one out to him: in his palm is another pestle, almost identical to the one Kita currently has, but the piece of string threaded through the end is white instead of red.  
  
“Oomimi-san scolded ‘Tsumu for breaking the mortar—said he wasted a decent piece of ceramic. But he has other special sets, and asked me to give this one to you. Oomimi-san will keep the matching mortar somewhere safe, and ‘Tsumu won’t know where to find it—he actually doesn’t know we’re giving this to you, either.”  
  
Kita takes it into his hands and exhales softly, feeling lighter than he has for the first time since he last saw Atsumu. He still has a connection to the foxes’ world—he can still be with them.  
  
“Why are you helping me, Osamu?” he asks, quietly. Osamu shakes his head.  
  
“We’re doing this for ‘Tsumu’s sake as much as yours, Kita-san,” he says. “Ever since he told you about the accident, he’s been feeling really, really down. We’ve tried cheering him up, but he can be hard to reach, sometimes. Honestly, he’s a bit of a pain. But he’s happy whenever he’s with you, and I suppose, as I am the more wonderful, kinder, and more caring brother—” Here, Kita smiles, “—I shouldn’t just sit by and do nothing. So…”  
  
Osamu stretches his arms comfortably, and then hops to his feet.  
  
“Where can I find him?” asks Kita.  
  
“There’s a big maple tree in the north-east corner of the house grounds that he likes sitting in,” Osamu answers. “He’s been hiding around there a lot lately, so that would be a good place to start.” He brightens. “Oh! He still thinks that you can’t see him anymore while you’re on the house grounds, so if you can startle him enough that he falls out of the tree, will you let me know?”  
  
“Osamu,” says Kita with a huff of laughter.  
  
“It was worth a try.” Osamu shrugs. “Anyway. Thank you for the pudding, Kita-san—I can see why ‘Tsumu likes it so much.”  
  
“Thank you, Osamu,” says Kita. Osamu steps swiftly towards the garden wall and leaps onto it, not quite as graceful as Atsumu, but with a touch more confidence, like he’d done it a thousand times before. He hops off it, over to the other side, and Kita sees a flick of a fox tail before he disappears from sight. The footsteps he leaves behind in the snow are a fox’s tracks.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

With the new pestle clutched in his hand, Kita visits the foxes’ house the next morning. At the sight of the house before him—grand, no longer run-down, well cared for—he breathes a sigh of relief, and makes his way towards the entrance.  
  
Akagi sweeps him up into a hug at the first sight of him, and Aran and Oomimi clap his shoulder happily. Suna, Ginjma, and Riseki are in the middle of playing a card game; Kosaku is sitting by them, fixing up the strings of an old koto; Osamu is nearby, practising some calligraphy. They all greet him, and Osamu meets Kita’s eyes, and nods in thanks.  
  
Kita steps outside, to the north-east of the lightly snow-covered house grounds, and looks up at the large maple tree that stands there, majestic despite its lack of leaves in the winter.  
  
There is a lone fox, curled up tightly on a low branch of the large tree that’s too high for Kita to reach. He is asleep, face tucked against his tail.  
  
Kita calls his name softly: “ _Atsumu_.” The fox wakes abruptly, raising his head and staring down at him with wide eyes, tensing as though ready to flee.  
  
“Please don’t run,” says Kita. “I just wanted to talk to you.”  
  
And he holds his breath for a moment. He hadn’t thought about what he’d do if Atsumu did run off—come back another day? Ask one of the other foxes for help?  
  
But he is lucky. After a while, during which the fox is stock-still like he is weighing up his options, there is a sudden puff of smoke, and once it clears, Kita sees Atsumu, sitting cross-legged on the branch. He is wearing a red haori and a dark grey kosode and hakama, with a warm light-blue scarf wrapped around his neck, and he is staring over at Kita with an expression that’s hard to read, but Kita can see the misery on his face—thinks that right now, he is seeing the difference between _wanting to be alone_ and _being lonely._ He feels an odd clenching in his chest again.  
  
“They gave me another pestle,” says Kita quietly. “They hid the matching mortar.”  
  
Atsumu’s shoulders slump in something like defeat, and he sighs.  
  
“Atsumu,” says Kita. “I know you’re worried, but… it’s okay, Atsumu. I know I can’t reasonably ask you to keep looking out for me for everything, so… you don’t have to. You’ve already done so much for me, and I’ll always be grateful for that.”  
  
His words are never empty, and he knows that Atsumu knows this. But there is so much more Kita wants to say: _thank you for the warning, thank you for staying with me when I was sick, thank you for the invitation to the banquet, thank you for sharing part of your life with me._ But none of it sounds right, everything sounds like a goodbye, which is the very opposite of what Kita wants to tell him. By default, Kita is blunt, composed, honest, and his words say what needs to be said, just as he always does what needs to be done. He is not so good at dressing up his words, taking detours when he can just get straight to the point, and Atsumu...  
  
There is another clenching sensation in Kita’s chest when he adds, “Please stop by again. The garden feels emptier when you’re not around.”  
  
This is, perhaps, the closest thing that Kita knows to a plea.  
  
Atsumu still has not moved nor said a word. Anything else Kita wants to say, dies on his tongue. He turns, and takes his leave.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Atsumu does not stop by the next day. But the bowl of squid-flavoured rice crackers that Kita leaves out in the evening is completely empty by the next morning.  
  
Kita doesn’t think much of it. Maybe it was just some hungry birds, or another wild animal.  
  
But he tries again.  
  
Later that evening, he leaves a pudding, and as he is taking the empty plate back in the next morning, he thinks he can see, from the corner of his eye, the flick of a fox tail vanishing over the garden’s wall, and there is a warmth in his chest, so much more welcome than that unpleasant clenching he has been feeling.  
  
That day, Kita has classes all day and two essays to write. It’s snowing and windy, and he doesn’t go to sit outside, but he does frequently stop by to peek out the window, just in case Atsumu is there. He isn’t. Kita leaves a large mandarin and a piece of inari sushi for him in the evening, and it’s gone by the morning, with only the peel and seeds of the mandarin left.  
  
The next afternoon is marginally warmer, and Kita takes his laptop and study materials outside, along with a low table, a warm blanket, a few disposable heat packs stuck to his clothes, and two piping hot curry buns on a plate. He sits down on the porch and opens his laptop, when he feels someone watching him. He looks up, at the garden wall, and when he sees Atsumu peeking over, Kita’s face breaks into a smile.  
  
“ _Atsumu_ ,” he calls out, and it feels like years, like lifetimes since he had last done so.  
  
With a familiar swiftness, Atsumu climbs over the wall and slowly makes his way to Kita. He still looks a little sheepish, a little guilty, but it’s a world better than that miserable look on his face when Kita last saw him.  
  
Atsumu kneels down beside him, close; Kita reaches out, reaches for him, and Atsumu leans into him, until his head is pressed against his shoulder, and Kita’s arm is around him, his fingers combed through Atsumu’s hair, and his blanket half-fallen onto the floor. Atsumu’s hands clutch at Kita’s jacket, and he sighs, quietly, and it feels like he has finally forgiven himself.  
  
They pull away after a while. Atsumu sits back, cross-legged, and Kita pushes the plate of curry buns towards him.  
  
“You look tired, Atsumu,” he says as he watches him bite into one of the buns, a mild look of bliss crossing his face. “Once you’ve had a proper meal, get some rest.”  
  
“I just got here,” Atsumu half-whines. But they both share a smile, an understanding.  
  
Kita pulls his blanket back over his shoulder and continues writing up an essay for one of his classes. Beside him, Atsumu continues snacking, staring out into the garden. This is familiar. This is good.  
  
When he is finished eating, Atsumu shuffles closer to Kita once again, snuggling up beside him and pulling at his blanket until it covers them both. It’s not really big enough, but Kita has a feeling that, given Atsumu isn’t wearing a hundred layers of clothing like he is, the cold doesn’t bother him very much.  
  
But Atsumu is warm beside him, and Kita is reminded of holding a fox close to his chest as he battled a bad cold and a fever in the middle of the night. He pushes the table with his laptop away, and they both sit like this for a while.  
  
“Why are you warm in some parts, but not in others?” Atsumu mutters, prodding at Kita’s side, at the disposable heat packs. Kita explains them, and when he is done, Atsumu is shaking his head, impressed.  
  
“Humans are amazing,” he says. “I’ll never understand.”  
  
“Would you like one?”  
  
“Mm… no, it’s fine.” Atsumu adjusts the blanket over his shoulder, before bowing his head and mumbling, “Thank you for coming by the house.”  
  
“It’s good to see you again, Atsumu,” says Kita quietly, and though he means it with all his heart, there’s a little more in his words that he doesn’t say: _thank you for forgiving yourself, thank you for coming back—_  
  
(— _to me_.)  
  
Atsumu knows, he thinks. He gives a small, embarrassed smile, and ducks his head even more, until he can lean down to rest on Kita’s shoulder. Kita leans his head against Atsumu’s, and they are both comfortable and warm. For now, at least, this will be enough.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Things return to normal from there, more or less.  
  
On the days that are warm or at least bearable, Kita will do some maintenance in the yard, or he will sit outside on the porch with his university assignments or his calligraphy, or nothing if he just wants a break. Atsumu will be by his side, snacking on food, chatting happily, or enjoying a comfortable silence, sometimes with his head on Kita’s shoulder if Kita isn’t working. Every now and then, some of the other foxes will join them, and Kita will bring out tea and listen to old memories told just for him, and the yard will be filled with talk and laughter.  
  
If Kita is practising his calligraphy, Atsumu sometimes joins in writing. Most of the characters he writes, like those on the map he’d given to Kita, are practised and of surprising neatness, and even his more artistic calligraphy is easy to read. Sometimes, he’ll write a haiku, and always smiles, bright as the sun, whenever Kita asks to keep it.  
  
If Kita or his grandmother are feeling under the weather, Atsumu sometimes brings dried medicinal herbs from the foxes’ house, if it isn’t so bad that western medicine is needed. In return, Kita would stop by the foxes’ house with a plate of snacks he and his grandmother have made, as thanks.  
  
Very rarely, Atsumu will warn for a bad incident. There was one day when he had advised Kita to stay away from stairs on his university campus, and Kita had found out that one of the steps on a major stairwell had cracked, and a fellow student had sprained her ankle stepping on it. On another day, his grandmother had slipped on some spilt water, but manage to steady herself by grabbing a chair just in time, because Atsumu had advised Kita to put it there.  
  
“The deities are kind to you,” Atsumu had told him. His hands are wrapped around Kita’s, and they are warm. “But they cannot always be kind, and I’m…”  
  
When he trails off unhappily, Kita combs his free hand through Atsumu’s hair, and brings him closer so that their foreheads touch.  
  
“You can’t always be kind in their place,” Kita murmurs. “I already know that, Atsumu. I promise, it’s okay.”  
  
Atsumu finds the balance after a while—uncommon as they are, he’ll keep silent for small mishaps that won’t cause too much damage, but there are the rare days when he is quieter than usual and his eyes look a little faraway, and Kita can’t be sure, but he takes that to mean that those are the days when he and his grandmother should be a bit more careful. Whether or not Atsumu knows this, Kita isn’t sure of that either, but he keeps it to himself. There’s an unspoken understanding that the two of them reach, a quiet gratitude from Atsumu that Kita doesn’t ask for more, a silent sorry that Atsumu can’t give him more.  
  
The quietest, gentlest nights are like so: Kita lying in his futon, and Atsumu, as a fox, curled up and tucked close to Kita’s chest when the night is cool. Atsumu is sleeping comfortably as Kita slowly and patiently traces characters against his fur at random: the kanji for _ocean_ , the kanji for _think_ , the hiragana _na_ , _Atsumu_ in hiragana, the katakana _ki_.  
  
The quietest, gentlest days are like so: Kita sitting on the porch and working on something, and Atsumu sitting by his side, with one hand curled around Kita’s arm and his head resting on Kita’s shoulder, or else both his hands tucked into his haori’s sleeves as he stares peacefully out into the garden. He’ll tell Kita stories of old, or Kita will tell him stories of new, of human things Atsumu doesn’t know, or Atsumu will be asleep, dozing off comfortably, and Kita will brush his hair from his eyes.  
      
He likes these quiet, gentle days and nights the most.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Kita picks out a long piece of paper, adds water to his inkstone, gently grinds an inkstick into it, chooses a brush, and he begins to write.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

The next time Kita has a casual dinner with the foxes, he brings a box of homemade strawberry daifuku.  
  
“Thanks, Shinsuke!” says Aran happily when he greets Kita at the front entrance and takes the box off his hands. “Come on through, we’re almost done preparing the food.” Kita follows him inside.  
  
_Shinsuke_ , the older foxes call him now. They like it better, the way it dances off their tongues, and Kita likes this sort of casualness and familiarity. The younger foxes still call him _Kita-san_ , out of habit more than anything, and he is fine with this, too.  
  
Atsumu spots them walking in, and bounds towards them.  
  
“Kita-san!” says Atsumu happily, seizing his arm. Aran dodges so he doesn’t knock into the box of daifuku.  
  
“Hello, Atsumu,” says Kita.  
  
“Damn brat!” says Aran. “I could’ve dropped these!”  
  
“Ah, but you _didn’t_ ,” says Atsumu. “So, then—”  
  
“ _Atsumu!_ ”  
  
Grinning, Atsumu tugs on Kita’s arm and pulls him into the main room, with Aran huffing indignantly as he makes his way into the kitchen.  
  
“Do the others need help making dinner?” Kita asks. Atsumu shakes his head.  
  
“Oomimi-san and Akagi-san usually share the cooking duties, and the rest of us take turns helping out. Today is Gin’s and Riseki’s turn; they’ll be fine.”  
  
They walk into the main room to see Suna setting down the last of the cushions they’ll sit on.  
  
“Good evening, Kita-san,” he greets. “I should’ve known you’re the reason Atsumu bolted off so quickly.”  
  
“Ugh, shut up,” says Atsumu. He snatches one of the cushions up and lobs it at Suna, who parries it away.  
  
“Don’t mess up my hard work!” he barks.  
  
“What hard work?” Atsumu splutters back. “You were just laying cushions down!”  
  
“You two.” Kosaku enters the room with a tray of teacups and sake cups. Osamu follows behind him, holding a large teapot. “Shut up or I will personally ban you from eating the daifuku.”  
  
“Ooh, now there’s something I’d like to see,” says Osamu.  
  
“Of course you would like that,” Aran adds, entering with two bottles of sake in his hands.  
  
“Is there anything I can help with?” Kita asks, because Suna and Atsumu look like they’re calculating their chances of frisbeeing the cushions at the others without breaking anything fragile. Aran sets the sake bottles down and shakes his head.  
  
“No, no, take a seat, Shinsuke. The food will be done soon. How is your grandmother?”  
  
“She’s well,” says Kita as they sit. “She’s also having dinner with friends tonight. Oh—” He turns to Suna and nods at him. “Thank you for the ginseng roots last week; granny couldn’t stop talking about how high-quality they were.”  
  
Suna smiles and looks pleased. “You’re welcome, Kita-san. I picked those out myself.”  
  
“Huh,” says Osamu, squinting at him. “The last time _I_ asked you for a ginseng root, you gave me a really, really withered piece. I see how it is.”  
  
“ _Osamu_.” Suna shakes his head. “You’re obviously an _amateur_. It wasn’t withered, it was _dried_.”  
  
“Do you know how hard it was to make tea out of that damn—”  
  
“That’s because you never do it right.”  
  
“It was _not_ because—”  
  
And they’re off, pointing fingers at each other mock-accusingly but grinning as they banter loudly over the quality of Suna’s stock of ginseng and other herbs. Atsumu looks like he’s having trouble containing his disgust at the barely-concealed fondness in their eyes, Aran’s pinching the bridge of his nose, and Kosaku is shaking his head, but Kita is fighting back a smile.  
  
“If you could make desserts as delicious as Kita-san’s granny does, I would consider giving you two pieces of ginseng root.”  
  
“If they’re going to be as withered as that piece you gave me—”  
  
“If you’re going to complain so much, you can go visit the Seijou lot yourself and buy th—”  
  
“All right, you brats,” says Aran, waving a hand at them. “Enough. I can feel my _soul_ turning into withered ginseng just listening to you.”  
  
Suna looks mock-affronted and says, “You know I don’t _have_ anything less than high-quality herbs!”  
  
“Remember when you gave that weasel that licorice root you originally said was better suited tossed into the garden?” Kosaku says, and Suna snorts.  
  
“All right, but he deserved it. Stole my fan and denied it the whole time. I loved that fan.”  
  
“I _did_ offer to chase him down, but you said no,” Atsumu chimes in.  
  
“ _Oomimi-san_ said no,” Suna corrects him. “I’d be happy to tackle that weasel again if I run into him.”  
  
“Do you see what I have to put up with?” Aran says, now looking at Kita, but with a warm smile amidst his exasperation that he doesn’t bother hiding. “Never a dull moment.”  
  
“I can see,” says Kita, smiling. “I like it.”  
  
“Kita-san.” Atsumu nods to his bag now. “Is that a gift for us?”  
  
“Don’t be rude,” Osamu chides him.  
  
“I’m only asking because I’m _curious_ ,” Atsumu shoots back. “Look, he’s got this box with him! Kita-san, you haven’t told us what it is, yet.”  
  
Kita rests his hand on the long box, about the length of his arm, poking out of his bag. He has practised enough, he knows the final result looks good and says plenty, he knows…  
  
The foxes are watching him curiously, silently. Kita takes a deep, slow breath.  
  
“I have something small for you all,” he says.  
  
Aran claps his hands together once and says, “Let’s have some drinks, first. I’ll call the others out.”  
  
Tea and sake is poured into their cups—Kita can (legally) share sake with them, now (Atsumu snorts and mumbles vaguely about human alcohol laws), and their yuzu sake is one of his favourites, though he still prefers tea. Oomimi, Akagi, Ginjima, and Riseki emerge from the kitchen into the dining room, and they all turn to him, air thick with curiosity. Kita had always brought food and drinks—this is the first time he has brought something more material. He supposes that, to them, this might be the equivalent of the pestles they’d gifted him.  
  
He is not nervous. He takes the long box from his bag and slides it across the table towards Aran, who opens the box and carefully lifts out a scroll. He unfurls it delicately, and when he lies it flat, vertical on the table’s surface, there is a collective sigh from the foxes.  
  
‘ _We don’t need things like memories_ ’, reads the kanji and hiragana running down the piece of paper fixed to the scroll, with artistically trailing brush strokes and ink as black as night. There’s movement and life breathed into each character, like they would whisper stories and dance if they could. Kita had written it like the scholars of old, like he had practised his whole life for it.  
  
“Ahh,” Aran breathes in reverence. “This is beautiful, Shinsuke.”  
  
“We should hang it up by the main entrance, so everyone can see it when they come in,” says Akagi, leaning over to have a closer look.  
  
“No, here in the main room,” says Oomimi, with a thoughtful nod. “It’ll be better protected from the sun and wind, and everyone can see it when we have gatherings.”  
  
“Ooh, good point.”  
  
“It’s not quite the kind of phrase I would’ve expected from you, though,” Aran tells Kita as he lifts the scroll carefully and passes it down the table so that the others can have a look. “You strike me as the type to hold onto memories instead.”  
  
“I guess I am,” says Kita slowly. “But I didn’t write it for me. Atsumu gave me the idea. It’s just something small, but I wanted to say thanks for all your hospitality.”  
  
Beside him, Atsumu rests his head on Kita’s shoulder, and smiles.  
  
“So formal!” says Akagi with a grin, picking up his sake cup and raising it to him. “Too polite! You’re always welcome here, Shinsuke.”  
  
“It’s as he says,” Oomimi adds, a smile on his face too. “Which reminds me—we still have food to get through. Suna, Atsumu, Osamu, come help us bring out the dishes; we’ve just finished cooking. No, Shinsuke, you stay put—you’re the guest! I hope you’re hungry.”  
  
He really is, he realises, and when they bring out steaming dishes of chicken, beef, octopus, sliced fish, leafy vegetables, fried tofu, and a large plate with several different types of mushrooms, Kita’s mouth is watering.  
  
“This all looks incredible,” he says.  
  
Suna grins and sets down the last plate of what looks like lotus root chips. “Whenever you’re over, Oomimi-san always cooks fancier dishes. He doesn’t put in so much effort when it’s just us. What I mean is—” He ducks when Oomimi, his hands now free, swipes at him, “—he just likes your company that much more!”  
  
“Is that any way to talk to someone who feeds you?” says Oomimi with a glare that Kita knows he doesn’t mean.  
  
Suna throws his hands up in surrender. “Your beef stew is the _best_ ,” he says in what is probably meant to be a pacifying voice. “But you can’t deny that you go all-out when Kita-san is here. When was the last time you made lotus root chips for a normal dinner?”  
  
“He’s got a point,” says Akagi, snickering. “When you were telling me about dinner plans for tonight, I was impressed. No one had to bribe you to fry up some octopus, either!”  
  
“Can’t deny that,” says Oomimi thoughtfully.  
  
“You don’t need to go out of your way for my sake,” says Kita with a little smile. “Even though I do really appreciate it.”  
  
Aran raises a sake cup at him. “You’ve given us a lot of joy,” he says. “Just like your calligraphy says, it’s true that we don’t need things like memories, but we’ve still remembered a lot of good times thanks to you.”  
  
“Thank you,” says Kita, raising his own teacup, his chest warm; he gives a quick glance at Atsumu, who is smiling back.  
  
“Let’s eat,” says Oomimi, and the others cheer, and they begin to dig in.  
  
Over the course of dinner, they jump topics several times: the foxes tell Kita stories of other spirits who are friends of theirs, such as some good-natured crows, some cats with whom they initially had some misunderstandings, and a group of owls with an unpredictable leader; a legend about a lonely mountaintop, and a god who sleeps, and a god who watches over him; somehow, they get onto the topic of learning to send insulting messages using the language of flowers; Kita finds himself telling them about Disneyland, which the foxes know of but have never visited, and they admit that they are confused as to why so many of Disney’s stories end in romance.  
  
When the time for dessert comes around, they clear away the dishes and bowls, and Kita helps distribute the daifuku. He thinks he’ll never get tired of seeing how delighted the foxes are upon receiving his and his grandmother’s sweets.  
  
The older foxes chat about a meeting they need to attend soon with some tengu; down the other end of the table, Osamu and Ginjima are playing some sort of violent hand-clapping game to claim the particularly plump piece of daifuku that’s sitting on the plate nearby; beside them, Kosaku eggs them on and Riseki watches, but Suna looks like he’s just a handful of seconds away from snatching the daifuku for himself while they’re preoccupied.  
  
Kita is contently drinking his tea. Atsumu, still sitting beside him, licks a bit of red bean paste off his thumb, and then turns to him, smiling.  
  
“The food was good, wasn’t it, Kita-san?”  
  
“Yes, thank you,” says Kita, setting his cup down. Atsumu reaches for the teapot and refills it.  
  
“It’s like Suna says…” He grins. “Oomimi-san always insists on making more special dishes when you eat with us. Akagi-san, too.”  
  
“That’s really nice of them.” Kita pauses, and then adds: “Atsumu… I’m sorry I didn’t write that phrase for you.”  
  
“Your calligraphy?”  
  
“Mm.”  
  
Atsumu shakes his head. “It’s more of a phrase for _us_ ,” he says. “I did say something like that, didn’t I?”  
  
“I suppose…”  
  
“What’s wrong?”  
  
Kita folds his hands together on his lap and looks at him thoughtfully. “It just occurred to me that I’ve never written anything for you before.”  
  
“Hm? I’ve kept some of your pieces, though—when you practice your calligraphy?”  
  
“They’re just for practice,” says Kita.  
  
“But…” Atsumu’s eyes widen a little, and he looks hopeful. “You really want to write something for me?”  
  
“I do, but I can’t think of what to write. Do you have any ideas?”  
  
“It can be anything!” says Atsumu happily, and Kita can’t help but smile. “I’d be happy with anything.”  
  
“That’s too broad, Atsumu; give me a topic.”  
  
“I have no clue! But anything’s fine, Kita-san.”  
  
“Hmm… I guess I’ll think about it.”  
  
Atsumu is positively beaming, bright as the sun, and Kita wonders if he could write about that, somehow condensed into just a few characters. He could write something with several lines of calligraphy, but he feels like that’s not the sort of piece he’s aiming for, this time—and in any case, what would he say?  
  
What would he write?  
  
What did he want to tell Atsumu?  
  
There’s a roar from further down the table, and they both look up to see Suna bolting out of the room, with Osamu and Ginjima rocketing off after him. Kosaku and Riseki are laughing so hard that they are crying. The plump daifuku is gone, and it is clear that Suna was the real winner in the end.  
  
Kita pushes the thought of calligraphy from his mind and sips his tea, enjoying the sound of laughter filling the room.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Over the next couple of days, Kita thinks and thinks and thinks.  
  
He remembers of the feeling of standing in his garden and knowing he is not alone; he thinks of simple snacks and meeting Atsumu for the first time, seeing a beautiful boy with a startlingly warm smile; of stories exchanged and things learnt about his great-grandparents; well-drawn maps and the first banquet, Atsumu’s delighted laughter at the sight of the plate of warm dorayaki, and then playing the koto with the other foxes performing with him; he thinks of walking into the foxes’ world and having meals together, lively and full of delicious food; Atsumu sitting on a branch of a maple tree; of lying tucked up with Atsumu beside him, warm in the cold nights; sharing a quiet afternoon on the porch together; a smile, bright as the sun.  
  
He thinks of a love story, of sorts, and how he would write that.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Kita picks out a piece of paper and carefully cuts it neatly to a smaller size. He adds water to his inkstone, gently and patiently grinds ink into it, chooses a brush, and he begins to write.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

When Atsumu’s head pops up over the garden wall, Kita is sitting alone on the porch with an envelope beside him.  
  
“Kita-san!”  
  
Kita’s expression softens in a smile. “Atsumu.”  
  
Atsumu swiftly scales the wall as usual and moves to sit beside him. His eyes sweep the area, and there is confusion in his eyes as he notes the lack of food.  
  
“You were waiting for me?” he asks.  
  
Kita nods. “I couldn’t figure out what snacks to get you today. Do you have anything you felt like eating?”  
  
Atsumu thinks for a moment, and then shrugs. “I don’t care, really. Let me stay here a while, and that’s enough.” He tucks his hands into the sleeves of his haori and grins over at Kita.  
  
His smile hasn’t changed since the day they first met properly, now more than a year ago. That startling warmth, that light, that colour—it hasn’t changed, and Kita catches himself thinking that he wouldn’t mind time standing still for a little while.  
  
If Atsumu could keep smiling, things would be okay.  
  
Kita takes the envelope lying next him, hands it to Atsumu, and says, “I wrote something for you.”  
  
The smallest part of him thinks that he may be making a mistake, but the arguably more foolish part of him—the part that didn’t mind inviting trouble, the part that wore his heart on his sleeve, the part that loved—pushes him forward. Curiously, Atsumu takes the envelope and opens it, pulling out a piece of paper that’s been perfectly folded into quarters.  
  
_Kita Shinsuke_ , reads the calligraphy written on the paper, neat and simple, each stroke deliberate, careful. The characters do not dance the way ‘ _we don’t need things like memories_ ’ had, but rather, they were the opposite: steadfast and strong, reminiscent of unmoving mountains, and built upon memories and history. It, too, looks like it’s been written by scholars, like Kita had practised his whole life to write it.  
  
Atsumu is very still as his eyes trail every stroke and every edge, ink sharp and clean against the white paper. After what feels like an age, he exhales softly.  
  
“It’s your name,” Atsumu says, uncharacteristically quiet.  
  
“It is,” Kita replies.  
  
“You—I’m—… you’re giving me your _name_ , Kita-san.”  
  
“I am,” says Kita, and Atsumu finally meets his eyes, confused.  
  
“You know what it means to give someone your name, don’t you?” he says. “You give them power over you. I could—I could give your name to any spirit or horrible demon you meet, and you would be theirs. You would have to be their servant for all your life.”  
  
“It’s true,” says Kita with an almost blasé nod.  
  
“Then?” Atsumu is staring at him like he’s lost his mind. “Why on earth would you give me something so precious?”  
  
Kita smiles. “Would you give my name to someone else? You wouldn’t keep it for yourself?”  
  
“I’m… I…” Atsumu looks back down at the paper. He is holding it like it is simultaneously the most fragile and most powerful thing in the world.  
  
“If you would like to,” says Kita as he folds his hands in his lap, “please keep my name safe, Atsumu.”  
  
If Atsumu could keep smiling, the world would be all right. If Kita could give Atsumu reason to smile and not be lonely anymore, things would be all right. If they could share quiet afternoons, lively meals with good company, old and new stories, sunny days, cold nights…  
  
If they could have this, _Kita_ would be all right. If they could hold onto this—  
  
Atsumu folds the piece of paper carefully back into quarters, presses it against his mouth for a moment with his eyes closed, and then tucks it close to his chest.  
  
“I will keep it with me,” he murmurs, now staring hard at the floor. There’s a redness creeping up in his cheeks. “I will keep it safe.”  
  
“Thank you, Atsumu,” says Kita, soft.  
  
Atsumu looks up at him slowly, and before Kita can say anything else, he moves forward and throws his arms around Kita’s neck. Kita wraps his arms around him too, lightly clutching fistfuls of his haori. Atsumu is warm—he has always been, and Kita finds himself unable to imagine his life without it all—this warmth, this light, this colour.  
  
“I’m so happy,” Atsumu mumbles into his shoulder, and the world is all right. Kita could invite trouble, could wear his heart on his sleeve, could love, and the world would be all right. He closes his eyes.  
  
“Me too,” Kita whispers.  
  
And he holds Atsumu a little closer.

 

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

Whenever Kita sweeps the backyard, wipes down the porch with his grandmother, or does any sort of work outdoors, the deities watch over him, a fox spirit stays by his side, and he is not alone.  
  


 

**Author's Note:**

> [twitter](https://twitter.com/naffnuffnice) | [tumblr](http://naff-nuff-nice.tumblr.com)
> 
> ☆☆☆ This work has also been translated into Russian by [**ebriosa**](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ebriosa/pseuds/ebriosa)!! The link to the translated work is [**here**](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ebriosa/pseuds/ebriosa). Thank you, ebriosa! ♡


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